Page 40 of Broken Truths

My heart pounds in my ears. I’m sure I just heard him correctly.

“Keegan told all of Carnegie that Dee was a virgin?”

“Well, he told Anne-Marie, and that’s all it took. I was right there. It was so fucked up. Every guy with a hard-on in school started to make bets that they would be the one to take Astor’s virginity. It was a big game.”

Holy shit. Leo was right. Men are just a bunch of walking hormones. And with that amount of money and power… It can turn into something dangerous. If a bunch of college kids tried to make Dee’s virginity into a game, who’s to say the Knights wouldn’t have either?

“Last I knew she was one, though,” Devon says as if he’s consoling me. Maybe he is. I’d rather she have died a virgin than the alternative. “He was just stupid and jealous. You know him. He’s an asshole.”

“Tell him when I see him I’m going to kick him in the nuts.”

I don’t know why I’m so surprised. It’s nothing that I couldn’t see him doing. She was right to keep her V-card away from Keegan. He didn’t deserve it, and if she did give it to him at the very end, he may not have even deserved it then.

He put her at risk. I’m sure he never thought of it that way, but he did.

Fucking Anne-Marie…

Then again, she grew up real quick when she had that shriveled, old penis inside her.

“I’ll tell him if you want, but that doesn’t sound like it would make him want to meet you.”

“You’re right. Maybe just keep that part to yourself.”

“Will do. Bye, Eden. I’m… I don’t even know what to say.”

“I know,” I tell him. “It’s okay.”

He walks out with his head down. The sun shines through the front door for a brief moment before James closes it behind him.

I turn, peering back into the room. “Well, now we know how Sir Jarvis knew Dee was a virgin.”

No one says much after that. We kind of just stare at the walls. I don’t know about them, but I’m taking in the world I thought I knew and then disassembling the walls and building it back up the way it actually is.

I always thought I was so safe being an Astor. That I was privileged. Sure, it gave me obligations I didn’t want, but to any outsider, I had the ideal life.

Little did the others know that with a prestigious last name like mine, you’re just playing in bigger, badder games. Ones you didn’t even know you were in until it was too late.

Alaric runs his hands through his hair. “Anyone else thinking that the note talking about a big night might have to do with this?”

If my bones could get any colder, they just did. It’s like I’m in an ice box all the time. The world just keeps attempting to suck all the warmth from me, but I’m determined to get it back. No matter the cost.

14

Sir Franklin Jarvis

The stoic face of Alistair Astor stares back at me. I tap my pointer finger against the table as I study the black and white picture. He was a formidable businessman. Soft where he needed to be hard but also discerning and severe in the boardroom.

A fury I can’t quite describe settles over my shoulder. Who kills someone like Alistair Astor under my watch?

A knock sounds on the door. “Come in.”

I already know from the security cameras that my successor is on his way. He doesn’t quite have the hard spirit Leonardo does, but he’s whip smart and willing to play the game. You have to be willing to play the game when you’re a Jarvis.

“Grandfather?”

I glance up. Vincent doesn’t look much like his father. In fact, he doesn’t really look like a Jarvis at all. Like with all of them, though, I can prove his blood relation. I don’t trust anyone with a cunt to tell me the truth, so paternity tests are mandatory when babies are born into this family. “Sit.”

Vincent does so, pocketing his cell phone just like I’ve taught him, and then he stares at me, waiting. “Alistair Astor,” I say, moving the newspaper to face him.

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