Chapter 65: Lawrence's POV

I killed David right after his thirtieth birthday ... ... and here I am about to kill his son as well ... except Lucas Greyson won't live to see his thirtieth birthday. He's only twenty seven years old. He's a kid. He's a kid that has become just like his father and the woman he chose for himself is only making him that much more like David. He's too much like David. At this rate, David might as well have never died because this boy has that same foresight and that same anger that seems to blind him beyond reason. And worst of all, just like David, he too has garnered respect and fear from people who can bury me and my family. I would have killed him when he was just a boy if I had known that he would end up like this. I would have listened to Liza and killed this boy when at just fifteen years old, he stopped an entire coupe in his family's company. Back then, we considered what Greyson Corporation would look like with Christian Greyson as its head. We decided against killing Lucas Greyson because the younger Greyson boy was just an angry bull that wreaked havoc. His own mother couldn't control him ... but I think the Ericsson girl made some headway with him. The younger Greyson boy wasn't like his brother. Lucas Greyson was known for his cool and calm demeanour. He knew how to sit and laugh and work with his enemies and knew how to appease an enemy to reach a goal. He was a lot like Lorraine in that sense. That woman, unlike her late husband, hated conflict and would rather carry the brunt of the struggle just to avoid a fight. Christian Greyson is not like that. The boy may be smart just like his father, but he also seemed to have inherited David's wrath. David was a butcher when it came to taking down his enemies and the younger Greyson boy seemed to have inherited that very same trait. Unlike his older brother, he didn't seem to view life and people as grey. He saw everything as black and white. Once he decided someone was an enemy, he did everything he could to make that person's life miserable. We thought Lucas Greyson was the moderately tempered one. I was convinced he got his mother's demeanour, so I decided to let him live. But I see how I wrong I was about that. He was just fooling us all these years. He hid his true nature from us while he was vulnerable. And while I thought I was grooming him to one day marry Lauren and hand over control of the company to me ... turns out, I was grooming an enemy that would one day destroy my entire family. I can't let this boy live. I'm struggling to understand when and how he became this powerful. When did this boy's word become law and when did I start trusting him blindly when he did nothing to earn that trust? Lauren. I let him live because of Lauren. I let him grow into a serpent all because Lauren had convinced us that she would marry him. We had no reason to believe that he wouldn't marry her. He did everything to make us believe he would marry my daughter one day. He gave that dim-witted girl a job at the largest and oldest engineering firm in the country. Then everytime he came to me with a mistake she made, he made it seem like her mistakes were miniscule as far as he was concerned. In the emails and reports, the mistakes were described as severe transgressions, but when we spoke in person, he seemed to want to brush it off and just encouraged me to write my own reports as to how I would go about fixing things. He always assured me I didn't actually need to take the measures I outlined in my reports. He created a paper trail that made it look like he was trying to punish Lauren, but I was using my powers as shareholder to stop the board of directors from penalising Lauren because she's my daughter. He played me. This f*****g boy played me. Did he do it on purpose or was he genuinely being kind? He let her move into his house. He let her help decorate that very same house that he now has another woman living in. He went on vacations with my daughter. He took her to all kinds of important events and never, not even once, did he take any of the women he was dating. He made me and Liza believe he was dating other women to get it out of his system before marrying my daughter. That man and his brother even ate dinners at my house a few times and they invited us to their farm. He created a more than reasonable expectation that he would marry my daughter and that made me turn a blind eye to all the power he was accumulating because I thought he would be sharing all that power with me in due time. He used my poor daughter. He may have justified his behaviour by saying he just wanted to repay Lauren for her friendship, but I see it now. He used her so that I would turn my back to him and let him become the mammoth of a serpent that he is today. And as soon as the woman he truly wanted reappeared, he stabbed Lauren and my entire family in the back. This boy is as vindictive as his father. He's just so much better at hiding it than David. He's as cruel and as calculating and I never saw it coming because he played the well-tempered boy that can play nice with his enemies so damn well. Shots went off just as Brian was about to shoot that boy with the afro. That boy has eyes that are identical to Ericsson's. I should have noticed it before today. He's Ericsson's brother - Charlene's first child. How the hell did Lisa miss that? I ran out of the car with Liza as Brian fell to the ground. He got shot. How? Snipers? Did Greyson know we were coming? No. We were so discreet. There's no way he knew. But then again, I have no f*****g money. I don't have any money to pay the usual people who would do this for me and I haven't done anything myself in such a long time. I might be f*****g things up without knowing. No. He couldn't have known we were on our way. We were discreet. No one could have known. Brian groaned from pain as he hit the ground. A bullet struck him in the arm. But Greyson also went down. Brian shot him in the shoulder, but that bullet wasn't meant for him. It was meant for that boy with the afro. Greyson shielded that boy ... so he must know. He knows that boy is Ericsson's brother. Fuck! How did Lisa miss all of this? We were clearly surrounded, but Liza and I still ran out of the car. We have to kill that boy. He's done too much harm to our family. I couldn't even afford a flight to London. I didn't even have money to book a hotel room or to pay for transportation and protection while I'm here. Brian had to cover all those costs. This boy is the reason why things I've never had to think about before, are now giving me headaches. The Ericsson girl is not the one we need to fear. It's him. Without him, she would have died at least a dozen times by now. Without him, her lawsuit wouldn't have been emboldened by all the other law suits that followed all because he instructed everyone else to attack us. Without him, all our assets wouldn't have been seized and frozen before we've even set foot in a court room. Without him, all our friends wouldn't have abandoned us in our time of need. That girl may be the sword that's targeting my family, but Greyson is her shield. If I get rid of her shield, I get rid of her. The little manpower and resources I have left need to all be focused on Greyson. I can deal with Ericsson myself if Lauren fails, but right now, the true enemy is Lucas Greyson. I got my gun out as I ran to Greyson. I need to shoot him myself. I need to shoot him in the head so that I can be sure that he dies just like his father. But I couldn't even do that. Someone shot my hand just as I was raising my hand to shoot him. I screamed in pain and found Charlene with a gun in her hand. She shot me. Is she the one who also shot Brian? She smirked ... that familiar smirk that I've seen on Ericsson's face and her brother's face. "If he dies," She said without a twinge of fear in her voice, "then you will burry your last remaining son, Brian. You will burry him in pieces and you won't even be able to find parts of him. I promise you that." I stormed Greyson once again. He hit his head against something and was still coming to. This is my only chance to kill this boy. He needs to die. Charlene won't stop me from killing this boy. "Lawrence!" Brian roared at me. "Don't!" But I still charged that boy. He's taken so much away from me. He's made me a failure of a man. I can't even keep the lights on in my own home because of that man. My daughter is in the hospital and I couldn't give her a cent to help her with her medical bills. Liza and I were so ashamed that we couldn't even muster enough courage to go see her. My little girl ... my perfect girl who is so much like me that it scares me sometimes... She lost a child because of this man. She's losing her husband and her family because of this man ... and I'm powerless to stop it. I can't even buy her a new car or house or boat to ease the pain. How can I face her when I've failed her like this? Greyson needs to die. If he dies. Ericsson will be a non-issue. My other hand got shot. How f*****g fast is Charlene? "The next bullet will go between your legs." She scoffed. "You forget that I was in the army, Lawrence. I can shoot you with both eyes closed." I was in so much pain, but I didn't care. I need to kill this boy. "He needs to die!" Liza and I both roared at Brian. "I asked for your help because if we get rid of him, then we get rid of your daughter. Do you remember what Lorraine was like after we killed David? She stopped attending every single important event, she even stopped her studies, Brian! She was studying to be a lawyer, but after David's death, she gave up on that dream. She didn't even have the strength to fight for David's company!" I yelled at him. "If it weren't for the secret allies David had planted in that company, she and her kids would have lost everything!" He looked unconvinced. ... and Greyson was starting to wake up .. This boy needs to die. Why can't he see that? "This man!" I roared again. "Is your daughter's ultimate weakness. She will NEVER get up if we kill him. She will cower away just like Lorraine. She will be an afterthought amongst people with money ... JUST LIKE LORRAINE!" "I need him." Brian looked at Greyson as he started to get up. "This boy accomplished a merger that even David couldn't close." He grinned slyly. "Greyson Corporation is the biggest engineering firm in America and Europe. No", he chuckled, "it's the biggest engineering firm in the world. I need those brains to make Kim Group the biggest engineering firm in Asia; especially after everything I've lost because my daughter." He started walking to me and Liza. My poor Liza was busy bandaging both of my hands and trying to stop the bleeding. I've failed her. I've failed my entire family and all because of a boy that's not even half my age. What kind of a man am I? "I want my daughter to turn in her grave while her husband funds Kim Group and helps us grow." His grin grew wider. "I want her spirit haunted in the afterlife as I get back everything I lost because of her and her husband marries your daughter." I shook my head. Lauren was wrong to hold out hope for this man. I see that now. She's so much like my sister. She was also so in love with David that she failed to see that David would never choose her. I see that now. David always chose Lorraine. He never wavered; never gave into the pressure from both his family and mine. He didn't even care that I was his best friend and that what he was doing was ending our friendship and turning us into enemies. He didn't care that he was losing friends left and right. He didn't care that he was the only Greyson child and so he had a duty to marry someone from a strong family to strengthen his own family. He didn't care that his own family threatened to disown him. That man didn't even care that my sister was also a dear friend of his. He didn't care that he was making someone who once called him a friend cry herself to sleep, refuse eating, refuse sleeping and try to hurt herself. He only cared about Lorraine. And his son is the exact same way. Lucas Greyson will only ever want that Ericsson girl. I see that now. My little girl never stood a chance. No one ever stood a chance. He won't forgive her for killing Ericsson. We were wrong to think he'd just break down and lean on Lauren again. He'll hate her and he'll make us all suffer for killing his wife. The Ericsson girl isn't the one we need to kill. She was never the one we should have been so focused on. Greyson should have been our target from the beginning. We can kill him now and put his brother in his place. Yes. That will work. The younger Greyson boy is fond of Lauren and has proven to be easy to manipulate at times. Lauren can marry him. She may be against it at first, but she'll learn just as her mother and I learned that marrying for love is so shortsighted. You marry to give yourself and your future offspring the best possible life. That's why she and her sister were able to have the lives they've had. Love is something you yearn for in your youth, but as you get older you realise there are things that are so much more important than love. Money, power, relevance, skill, influence, security ... all those things trump love every single time. She'll grow to accept the young Greyson boy and she'll see that I saved her from a life of yearning after a man who has only ever used her as a pawn to blind me. "He won't do that." My voice broke from the pain. "He will never marry Lauren. He's just like David, Brian; except his wife is already educated and has the power to make him so much more dangerous than David ever was!" Greyson was looking at me with a slight smile on his face. He had a hand on his wounded shoulder to stop the bleeding, but other than that, he didn't look scared or bothered in the slightest bit. We're playing right into his plan. I just know it. I don't know what he's done or what he's planned, but things are going according to his plan; not ours. Brian's men suddenly came rushing and knocked the three of them out - Greyson, Charlene and Charlene's boy. Charlene has had a gun on her this entire time. Why didn't she shoot those men? I looked at Brian's gun shot wound. He was shot from the back. That entry wound was from the back. There's no way Charlene took that shot. Was I also shot from the back? This boy already has people watching us. Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! He's letting this happen. He's letting us think we have the upper hand. Why? Why is he putting his own life at risk? Why? "Brian!" I charged at him. "You need to listen to me. This boy-" I didn't get to finish. Someone knocked me out from behind.