Final Debt (Indebted #6)(47)

The hate toward the family who’d taken my everything never ceased—bubbling, billowing, wanting so much to deliver revenge.

And now, I had a way to extract that revenge.

In the days before we worked for the Weavers, I’d been a hopeful girl looking for love. I’d met Frank young and fell pregnant within months. For years, I thought our troubles of living on the streets, of begging and stealing, would be the lowest point in our lives.

However, we hadn’t met the Weavers yet. We hadn’t entered into their employment. We didn’t know how bad things could get.

I wanted to rest. I needed to rest. But I couldn’t.

For a time, things had been good with the Earl of Wavinghurst, but then I ran out of energy to perform and beguile. He had an issue with his fists, and although I willingly paid for my freedom from the Weavers with a little pain, I’d reached my threshold.

It was mutual—the day he asked me to leave.

I had nothing of my own, only my precious grandson, and traded the staff quarters of his manor for the slums of the London poor.

The Weavers were dead.

Sonya gave birth to a boy followed by twins—a boy and a girl—a year and a half later. The firstborn girl had been delivered, and in order to claim the Debt Inheritance and finally balance the karma scales, I had to find more power and immeasurable wealth so William was in a position to claim his birthright.

In the meantime, I had to find a way to put food in my grandson’s belly. I didn’t want to, but I had no choice—I returned to what I’d become with the earl. I sold my body; willingly giving the only asset I had left to stay alive.

William’s mother—the whore I’d interviewed, given to my son, and bought her child—helped me gain employment with her current madam. And I was grateful. William was growing well. He wasn’t sickly and grew strong. He would make a fine Hawk someday. All I had to do was provide for him at his youngest, so in turn, he would provide for me at my oldest.

We moved around a lot that first year, living up to the last name Hawk given to us by the court. Hawks were scavengers, predators, always ready to swoop and steal. I’d never liked the name, until now. Now, I embraced it and nurtured my grandson. All his life, I’d told him bedtime stories of what the Weavers did. I took him to the neighbourhood park where Sonya would walk her children and show him the daughter who would soon belong to him.

He watched that little girl with untold interest, begging me to introduce them, to play with her. It took a lot to ignore his requests. I didn’t know what would be better. For them to meet as children or as adults. What would be easier to carry out the terms?

More years passed and I picked up work in sculleries and markets. Along with the occasional trick in a dark alley, we had enough to get by. We made do. William continued to grow, his interest in our history and what the Weavers had done increasing as the years rolled on.

However, he took matters into his own hands when it came to meeting Sonya’s daughter. On his fourteenth birthday, I gave him a few coins and told him to head to the local market to pick up whatever he wanted for his birthday treat.

Only, he came back with the money and a story of meeting a Weaver girl who asked to be called Cotton, even though her name was Marion.

Time had sped up and soon both firstborn children would be of age to begin the Inheritance. However, I often caught William doing strange things. He was strong, oh yes. He was well-spoken, kind-hearted, and hard-working, but there was an oddity about him I couldn’t explain.

I would lay in bed at night pondering why he was so different. Why he was so aware of others’ plights, why he would often give our hard-earned money to those deserving, or soothe random acquaintances in the street.

As he grew older, he couldn’t handle crowds as well as other young men. He’d shake and sweat, striking fear into my heart that he would fall ill with the sweating-sickness like his father.

I did everything I could to shelter him. I saved every penny and prepared for a better life.

And finally, that better life arrived.

Our new existence began one evening at the local brothel, where a share of my nightly profits provided a mouldy bed. After work, I headed back to the temporary home I’d found thanks to a local baker’s kindness.

William looked up, covered in flour—as usual—working all hours of the day for the baker and his customers. He preferred this job—away from people, hidden in a kitchen with only his thoughts for company. He’d bloomed into a delightful, handsome man.

I couldn’t believe he would turn twenty-one next month.

I was proud of him. Proud of myself for never quitting, even when life became so hard.

Dropping my shawl on a flour-dusted chair, I said, “I heard something, Will. Something that will get us far away from here and somewhere better.”

My grandson, my darling grandson, looked up. His golden eyes, courtesy of his father glowed in his icing-smeared face. His hands kneaded the fresh dough, and his smile warmed my soul.

Every time I looked at him, my heart broke remembering my daughter and son. Despair and fury never left me alone—they fed me better than any other substance, and until I got back at those who’d wronged me, I would remain alive and deliver vengeance.

William wiped his hands on a tea towel, sitting on the roughly-sawn stool by the oven. Moving to the bucket of water, I rinsed my arms and neck wishing I could cleanse my body from the foul stench of men who’d used it.