Heart And Soul

❝𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐰𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐲-𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐞❞

Sitting on the other side of the glass, I lifted the phone to my ear, "It's been a while since you last came to visit. Did you miss me?"

Everyone around me was either grinning or sobbing with their loved ones. Some share their life joys to catch them up. Others were upset they weren't there for the biggest moments of their lives. I came to see the woman who was the reason for my nightmares.

The woman who made me shut out everyone in life besides the boys.

I snorted, "got busy with things. People."

She looked older.

Her brown hair faded out. The dark bags sagged under her eyes. The wrinkles were clearly than day. She looked like hell but then again she put me through it so it's only fair that she got it.

"How long has it been since you got locked away? Eight years right?" I taunt. Her hand tightened around the phone, leaning closer.

"I see you've grown to be a bastard just like that old man you praise," I raised a brow, "at least he wasn't the one who put his hands on me."

"Oh no, maybe not on you because he has done worse things than beat people, Dean. He's ruined more families thence can count on his hands,"

I felt every inch of my skin burn. My heart pounding against my chest. What did she know? Last I recall she couldn't give a shit about dad or anyone in our family?

"He's sent families to jail and poverty, Dean. He has more enemies than friends on his side and once you take over, they'll hate you just as much as they do him,"

"What fictional bullshit are you spewing?"

She chuckled, "you don't know? Ask about the Grayson's. He sure has a lot to say about them and his family...there is still so much that you don't know, Dean. So many dark twisted secrets that you have yet to find out about that family your pride yourself on so much."

My teeth ground against each other.

Finn was tied to the Grayson.

"Struck a nerve, sweetheart? They'll end up hurting you worse and leave you questioning who the real monster is. Them or me?"

Slamming the phone back into place, the sound of my chair scraping echoed through the room.

I hated how she still managed to get on every single nerve of me after all these years.

Leaving the prison, I headed back into my car, calming my breathing. She left a whirlwind of questions running through my head. They both did.

Every time I answered his calls. Every time I so much as mentioned him her mood would instantly turn into something sour. It constantly played in my head what he could have possibly done to her. To her family that made her act like this.

Starting the car, I pulled out of the parking spot and back into town. To the only person that could give me the very answers I needed.

🌹🌹🌹

"Not window climbing today?" I shook my head, "not today...I need to ask you something,"

"Just give me a minute," nodding my head, I sat down on the porch steps until she reappeared beside me, with one of my hoodies on.

"When did you get this?"

"That's not important right now. What do you want to ask?"

I wet my lips, "my grandfather and what he did to your family."

"Dean.."

"Finn, please...I don't want any of the half-truths that I know he'll give me. I wanna know what he did. What hell I'm going to be walking into"

She let out a sigh, "I don't know the full story entirely. Knox won't walk about it either. Katie, his wife, described it to be the worst part of his life to occur. So, I can only tell you so much—"

"I think I was thirteen at the time. Knox had dragged me out with him to one of those work parties or whatever. He wanted me to befriend the kids, future heirs, and heiress, so when I took over Grayson entertainment I had investors and connections"

"I heard her grandfather talk about Knox. He called him a bunch of things, an egotistical rich kid, a fool thinking he could be successful without his name. That he was just some wannabe poor kid. How he you'd never be successful as he was and he was just setting himself up for disappointment."

I felt my throat start to close up at the thought of him saying those things.

"I didn't think much of him after that despite how pissed off I was. It wasn't until I was sixteen when I was dog sitting, I stumbled across some of Knox's documents, his stocks her plummeting. His employees were either leaving or getting laid off because he couldn't pay them properly.—"

"—Investors started pulling out one after the other. Later that year, we went again and this time I stuck to Knox...we heard William laughing and gloating about how unlucky we were. He didn't realise we were right behind him when he started bragging about how quickly everyone stopped siding with Knox with a little blackmail and bribing...then everything clicked that night. The walkout, the investors dropping like files. The drop in stocks. William had paid off everyone enough to live comfortably for the next five years if they did as he asked them to."

"He led Knox to bankruptcy. For almost two years Knox struggled to get his gaming company back up. He almost lost everything. We almost lost everything. My father was riding his money on Knox and we could have lost our house along with it."

"That night when we were talking at the gazebo...he did it again."

My head snapped towards her. He was the reason?

She was upset because of him. My own blood.

"He went on about him being a fraud. He was some kid running around in circles and accusing him of buying his way back up the ladder."

I clapped my hands together, trying to stop them from shaking, "why didn't you tell me about this? Any of it?"

"We weren't exactly friends back then Dean. And I knew how much you looked up to your grandfather, how much you loved him, Dean. I didn't want to ruin that for you. I didn't want to be the reason you lose another person you love."

"It was hurting you tho... why wouldn't you tell me that something was hurting you?" I pressed the back of her hand to my lips.

"It doesn't hurt, Dean. Maybe it stings a little remembering how Knox was back then but it doesn't hurt. I'm just annoyed with him, that's all."

"What's made you curious? You've known I don't like him for a while so why are you asking now?"

I swallowed past the lump in my throat, pulling her closer, for my own comfort. I held her there for the moment, taking in every second of her. It's funny how reliant I've become on her comfort. The me of last year wouldn't be like this.

I wouldn't be opening up to people. Letting people opening see my scars. I wouldn't be willing to have someone in my room. My own space. I wouldn't have someone as close as Finn is. physically and emotionally.

She made things easier for me. And I wasn't the only one who noticed it.

"I went to see my mother for the first time in a while today. She said something that made me curious so I came to you right after."

"I'm guessing it wasn't the greases reunion,"

A quick chuckle pulled through my lips, "not the reaction I was expecting either but I shouldn't have expected too much from her anyways."

It was a lesson learnt...

Never expect good from anyone in this family. Not even yourself.