Black Thorns (Thorns Duet #2) by Rina Kent

My grandparents still actively try to ruin me and Nate for turning our backs on them, but I couldn’t give a fuck about them and their legacy.

If there’s anything I learned after being at the brink of death, it’s that I don’t have time to play other people’s games.

I have my own.

Before, I always saw my grandparents as my saviors and I accepted that I had to pay my dues by being the perfect Weaver. But I was wrong.

They only ever cared about themselves. They’re the reason Dad ended up in Japan, broke and with nothing to fall back on. They’re the reason we were poor and Mom had to steal from dangerous people, which is what got her and my father killed.

My grandparents might not have had a hand in it, but they indirectly participated in their deaths.

I was only fooling myself by thinking I wouldn’t meet the same fate.

So I had two options. Either I became their puppet or I got out of their shadows.

I chose the latter.

We still see each other at her banquets, because they like to brag about my and Nate’s accomplishments, even when they’re privately against them.

The door opens and Daniel stops his photo session when Knox walks in, dressed in a white tuxedo. Seriously, he looks like some Italian businessman from the sixties, but surprisingly, he pulls the look off with his build.

He pauses in the entrance and stares at the ceiling as he forms an L with his thumb and forefinger. “Take a picture, Dan. Make sure the line of my jaw is visible.”

Daniel complies, circling him like he did me. “Give me your best poses, my muse. Yes, more brooding…more handsome but still less than me. That’s it, give me the mystery, the thrill…”

They spend a few minutes taking pictures and feeding each other’s egos.

Daniel and Knox are both English and came to the States after they graduated high school. They studied law at Harvard, fucked half the female population, and are currently plotting to conquer the other half.

They’re also Asher’s acquaintances through Aiden King, a mutual friend from England from when my childhood friend studied in Oxford.

Daniel specializes in international law because it gets him on the cover of countless magazines around the globe. Knox has made criminal law his bitch because, as he said, he has ‘tendencies to satiate.’

We met after I joined Weaver & Shaw, Nate’s law firm that he founded with his best friend/ex-rival, Kingsley Shaw.

At the start, we competed so hard and made each other’s lives hell. They hated me because I’m Nate’s nephew and then ganged up on me. But over the years, that rivalry has become our favorite pastime. We enjoy digging holes for each other and waiting to see if the other will take the bait.

We give Nate a headache, but it’s worth it.

We all recently made junior partner, but it’s far from being the end of our weird-as-fuck rivalry.

Daniel and Knox finish their photo shoot and force me to take a selfie with them that they’ll probably blast all over their social media pages.

“Are we ready to go or does your ego need more stroking?” I ask in my bored tone.

I almost always sound that way now.

Dull.

Hollow.

Down.

I lost a part of my soul seven years ago and I’ve never managed to get it back. Which is strange as fuck since I thought I didn’t have a soul in the first place.

Finding out I actually do, then losing it cost more than I can afford.

“Someone take this grumpy fucker and toss him somewhere that I can’t see,” Daniel jokes.

“Or hear,” Knox adds.

“Or even think of.”

“Nate would kill us, though.” Knox taps my head. “You know how protective he is of his little prince.”

I flip them off and head to the door. They follow after me and fall in step on either side of me. The organizers gave us a special room we can retreat to whenever we wish, which definitely has to do with the amount of money Nate donates.

The moment we step out, a myriad of sounds and colors explode in front of us.

Low classical music fills the space and staff members dressed in formalwear offer us glasses of champagne.

We each take one and Daniel smiles, making sure his dimples are on full display as he winks at the waitress who blushes and scurries away.

The attendees are wearing either tuxedos or cocktail dresses, and the women have their best pieces of jewelry on exhibit. Chatter fills the air as everyone mingles.

Nate sent us to this charity event to give away some of his money and snatch clients from other firms.

So our mission is to basically help the poor and take from the rich.

Nate being Nate will probably show his face later on like he’s making some sort of a surprise appearance.

For now, his three ‘show-offs,’ as he likes to call us, will bear the weight of attending this gathering until his majesty is here.

Many women bat their eyelashes at us as we pass them by. We attract that type of attention when we’re in public, and being the focus of these kinds of events is Daniel’s kink.

Knox’s, too, when he’s in the right mood. And he seems to be tonight.

Both of them smile at the passing ladies and Daniel is still making sure they notice his dimples. The fucker uses them as a magnet any chance he gets.

“I’ll take the west wing,” he announces. “Lots of beautiful ladies.”