Becoming Us(9)
The chaos they’re referring to is the loss of their own personal wealth and power. For instance, if the president was someone they didn’t put there, someone they couldn’t control, decisions might be made that would disrupt their perfect little world.
They don’t care about everyone else. All they care about is preserving the life they’re accustomed to. A life of incredible wealth and power. But they’d never admit that’s what they’re doing. They prefer to stick to their saving-the-world mantra. And some of them actually believe it. In fact, when I talked with some of the members last year, a few of them actually said that the world as we know it would end if they weren’t controlling it.
“Garret, do you think William still won’t believe me? Even after he talks to Grace and your dad?”
“It’s hard to say. I don’t know how close he was to his brother. Sometimes when someone’s dead, it’s easier to forgive what they’ve done or to pretend those things never happened.”
“If that’s true, then he’ll hate me. William will hate me for saying those things about Royce.”
“Which is why he can’t know what really happened that day at my house. If he gets pissed at you for saying that stuff, or if he thinks you might tell your story to the press and ruin his brother’s name, he might decide to come after you.”
“Come after me? What do you mean?”
“Think about it, Jade. Think about what would happen if he told the other members you were at my house that day and witnessed all of that. William wouldn’t have to tell them you were Royce’s daughter. He could just say he found out you were at the house when Royce shot me.”
“You’re saying William would tell the members that so they’d kill me?”
“I hope not, but we don’t know anything about this guy. What if he’s not that different from Royce? We can’t be too careful.”
“Why wouldn’t he just kill me himself?”
“Because Grace might find out and he wouldn’t want her knowing he did that. It’s better if someone else did it.”
“That doesn’t make sense. William isn’t a killer. If he was, he would’ve killed me when he thought I was trying to steal his family’s money.”
“I agree, and that’s why I don’t think he’ll do anything to you. But since we’re not one hundred percent sure, we can’t take any chances. So it’s best if he doesn’t know you were there that day.”
Jade leans over and hugs my chest. “I don’t feel very good. I thought I’d be happy when I finally met William, but I’m not. I’m not sure how I feel.”
“I’m sorry, Jade.” I put my arms around her. “This whole thing is just complicated.”
Nothing’s simple in families like mine and the Sinclairs. After seeing how hard it was just to date me, Jade knows this, but she doesn’t realize how complex things can get when the organization is involved. People like my dad and William have to be careful in everything they do. There are consequences to every action and your friend can become your enemy overnight.
I don’t think William’s an enemy, but in our world, you can never be sure.
3
JADE
My stomach’s in knots as I try to process what Garret just said. I don’t want to believe William would try to hurt me or send bad people after me. He’s my uncle, and in my head I’ve already imagined him being this warm, kind person, like his parents. Maybe it’s naive of me to think of him that way, given that he’s part of the organization, but Arlin was a member and he wasn’t evil, at least not the side of him I saw. And Pearce isn’t either. Like Garret said, the organization forces the members to do these things. It’s not a choice.
Last spring, Grace told me a little about William. She made him sound like a good man. She said he wasn’t at all like Royce, and Arlin said the same thing. But maybe William has a dark side his parents don’t know about. Royce certainly did, and Grace and Arlin didn’t find that out until it was too late.
Grace said William works all the time and is married but doesn’t have kids. His wife doesn’t work but she’s involved in a lot of charities, which I’ve found is what most wealthy women do to fill their time, including Grace and Katherine.
Other than that, I don’t know anything about William. But I did want to meet him someday. Having Grace in my life makes me want to meet more of my family. And since I don’t have anyone left on my mom’s side, I wanted to get to know my dad’s side, even if it’s just William.