POV: Finn
Jackson wanted a tour of the company. What Jackson wanted, Jackson got—that was the first lesson every Blackwood learned before they could walk.
I'd spent thirty years perfecting the art of smiling through bullshit, but walking my uncle through Cadence Records tested every ounce of that training. The man moved like a shark through water—slow, deliberate, absolutely certain that everything in his path existed only to be consumed.
"This is Studio A," I said, keeping my voice professionally neutral. The kind of tone I usually reserved for investors and women's husbands. "We recorded three platinum albums here last quarter."
"Impressive." Jackson's tone suggested it wasn't. His eyes swept over the mixing boards, the soundproofing, the gold records lining the walls—and found all of it wanting.
"The acoustics are considered some of the best on the East Coast. Artists specifically request—"
"And who manages artist relations in this department?"
I stopped mid-sentence. Smiled. The charming one that usually got me out of trouble. "I do."
"You." Jackson stopped walking, turned to face me with that predatory assessment I'd learned to dread as a child. Back when I still thought I could earn his approval. Back when I was stupid enough to try. "The playboy. The one who treats business like a party."
"I take my work seriously."
"Do you?" His smile could cut glass and leave the shards smiling back. "Tell me something, Finn. These artists you manage—how many of them have you fucked?"
The question landed like a slap in a room full of witnesses. My jaw tightened before I could stop it. "That's not relevant to—"
"It's entirely relevant." Jackson resumed walking, forcing me to follow like a dog at heel. "You have a reputation. Women, men, anyone attractive enough to catch your attention for more than five minutes." He paused outside the post-production suite, examining equipment he couldn't possibly understand. "I'm wondering if you've managed to keep your dick out of company assets, or if that's too much to ask."
"My personal life doesn't affect my professional performance."
"Your personal life IS your professional performance." He turned, and the fluorescent lighting made his face look carved from something cold and expensive. "That's the problem with you, Finn. You've never understood the difference between fucking around and actually building something."
I could have defended myself. Listed my contributions, my successes, the artists I'd discovered and nurtured into household names. But I'd learned long ago that Jackson didn't want explanations. He wanted submission.
We continued walking. Past the editing bays. Past the rehearsal spaces. Past the conference rooms where deals worth millions got hammered out over catered lunches and carefully positioned water bottles.
Then Jackson stopped outside the glass-walled conference room on the third floor.
Jasmine sat inside, reviewing contracts, completely oblivious to our observation. Hair pulled back in that messy way she did when she was focused. Pen between her teeth. Frowning at something on her screen like it had personally offended her.
Beautiful. Christ, she was beautiful in that effortless way that made my chest tight every single time.
"Speaking of which." Jackson's voice dropped to something intimate and poisonous. "What exactly do you see in her?"
"She's—"
"Or is it just the novelty?" He interrupted like my opinion was an inconvenience. "Threesomes with your brothers. Sharing a woman like a toy passed between children. Is that what gets you off, Finn? The taboo of it?"
"It's not like that."
"Then what is it like?" Jackson turned to face me fully, and his eyes held nothing but clinical assessment. Like I was a specimen. A disappointment under glass. "Because from where I'm standing, you don't actually feel anything for her. You're playing house because Liam decided it was fun, and you've never had an original thought in your life."
The words hit somewhere I'd spent years protecting. That soft place underneath the charm and the jokes and the easy smiles.
"What do you actually know about her?" Jackson pressed. "Her childhood? Her dreams? Her fears?" He leaned closer, and I could smell his cologne—expensive, suffocating. "What she looked like the first time you met? Or did you meet her the same night you all fucked her?"
"She changed my life."
"She complicated your life." The correction was surgical. "There's a difference. Before her, you were successful. Respected. Building something that might have actually meant something. Now you're a punchline. The three brothers sharing one woman like she's a holiday timeshare."
"You don't know what you're talking about."
"Don't I?" Jackson's smile turned cruel. The kind of cruel that came from decades of practice. "Tell me how you met her, then. Tell me the romantic story of how Finn Blackwood fell in love."
Silence.
Because there was no romantic story. There was a website. An auction. A woman desperate enough to sell herself and three men rich enough to buy.
"That's what I thought." Jackson watched Jasmine through the glass, his gaze crawling over her like something that left a residue. "You didn't fall in love. You made a purchase. And now you're pretending the transaction was something more meaningful because the alternative is admitting you paid for a whore and caught feelings."
"Don't fucking call her that."
"Why not?" His eyebrow raised—amused, condescending. "She sold her virginity online to the highest bidder. What would you call someone who sells their body for money?"
"She did it to save her brother." My hands clenched at my sides. "She's not—"
"A whore is a whore regardless of motivation." Jackson's voice dropped lower. Quieter. More dangerous. "You bought her virginity, Finn. You and your brothers pooled your money and purchased a woman like a car or a watch or a particularly nice piece of art. And now you're playing pretend family while the entire world laughs at you."
"Fuck you."
"Eloquent." He straightened his cuffs with maddening precision. "Your mother—my sister—she died giving birth to you. Did you know that's why I took you in? Because she begged me. With her last breath, she begged me to make sure you became something worthwhile." He gestured at the glass, at Jasmine, at everything I'd built and believed in. "This is what you've become. A man who buys whores and calls it love."
"She's not a fucking whore!"
"She spread her legs for money." Jackson's voice was ice wrapped in silk. "She spread them for all three of you. She's currently spreading them for my other sons while you watch." He paused, letting each word land. "The only question is whether you're too stupid to see it, or too pathetic to care."
My hands shook with the effort of not swinging at his face. Of not giving him exactly what he wanted—proof that I was nothing but impulse and poor decisions.
"I think we're done with the tour," Jackson said mildly, adjusting his jacket like we'd been discussing quarterly reports. "I've seen everything I need to see."
He walked away. Unhurried. Unconcerned. Absolutely certain he'd accomplished exactly what he'd set out to do.
I stood outside the glass walls, watching Jasmine work, watching her chew on that pen and frown at her screen and exist in a world where she didn't know I was falling apart three feet away.
And for the first time since this started, I wondered if anything I felt was real—or just the delusion of a man who'd paid for something and convinced himself it was a gift.