Business Only

Chapter 37

XAVIER POV

"Your brother, Eric King, is dead." she says.

The prude tone in her voice is gone when she tells me the sad news.

"What? How? When?" I bombard her with questions, my chest rises up and down rapidly as I lose control of my breathing.

"Mr King, please calm down. I'll tell you everything." I go over to the kitchen, taking a bottle of water out of the fridge and chugging all of the cool liquid down. It felt refreshing as the cold water ran down my throat, especially after a night of alcohol and hospital drips.

When I go back down to the dining table I gesture for her to speak.

"Eric was found dead in his hospital room about 2 hours ago, the reason of death was suicide." her voice lowers at the last word of that sentence.

"What did you do with him?" I ask, my voice is louder and angrier than I expected it to be.

"He is in the morgue until you decide what to do?"

"Me?"

"Eric left you as his next of kin - anything we do now must be authorised by you." she explains.

"Like what?" I ask, there can't be anything to authorise when he's dead now.

"Well if you choose to investigate his death then we will hand his body over to forensics - otherwise you can take it whenever you're ready for any final rites or funeral."

"He really killed himself?" I whisper, I couldn't believe it at all.

"He was a disturbed man Mr King, never eating, always in his cell and the lack of familial visits didn't help his condition." her lips form a thin line.

A heavy feeling of guilt sits on my chest, was I really responsible for this?

"I don't want to investigate this any further." I state "I will come to collect the body after arranging for the funeral." I say.

She gets up from her seat "You have 28 days." she says before seeing herself out.

When I finally have a moment to myself, I take a second to fully absorb what has happened.

My brother is dead.

I didn't know how to feel about this - on one hand, he ruined my life in every way imaginable, but on the other hand he was family and as much as I hated him I couldn't help but care.

I sit in silence contemplating all the events that have happened in the past 2 days, for what seems like hours but is only a few moments.

My phone rings, pulling me out of my thoughts, I check who is calling and I'm genuinely surprised.

But my hopes get the better of me and I have to remind myself that she's probably calling for business or to just mock me now that she practically owns everything that was once mine.

"Hello Amelia?" I deadpan.

"Xavier," she breathes out and my heart skips a beat. I couldn't get lost in my optimism again however, this time I give her her own attitude before she can fire at me.

"Miss Davis if you have any relevant information please let me know, otherwise you are wasting my time."

"I need you to come to my house, as soon as possible." she whispers, sounding slightly hurt from what I said.

"I'm sorry." I say sarcastically "but now that you've taken everything from me, I don't have time to be your personal fuck buddy that you call as you please." I spat.