Reborn Rich: The Marvelous William Hudson.

Chapter 2

“You always walked around like nobody could touch you.”

Benjamin's voice was low and measured as he crouched down and grabbed William's jaw, forcing his face upward. His fingers dug into William's skin hard enough to leave marks.

“Like you were untouchable. Like you were better than everyone around you.”

He stared into William's eyes for a long moment, then he pushed him of the wheelchair.

Then he stood.

“Well that ends here.”

He walked to it without hurrying, grabbed it with both hands, lifted it high above his head, and brought it crashing down directly across William's back.

The sound it made turned the stomach.

William's eyes shot wide open. His mouth formed a scream that his body refused to release. Every muscle in him seized from the impact, shuddering violently, his vision exploding white before beginning to break apart.

Benjamin tossed the wheelchair aside like an empty box.

But he was not finished, he pulled his foot back and drove it hard into William's ribs. The crack was audible. William's body folded as much as it was able, which was almost nothing, his paralyzed legs useless beneath him, his arms barely responding.

Benjamin kicked him again. This time across the shoulder, spinning him partially onto his back.

Then he reached down, grabbed William by the front of his shirt with both fists, lifted him several inches off the floor, and slammed him back down. William's head bounced off the hardwood. Stars detonated across his vision.

“Benjamin.” Lydia's voice came from across the room, calm and almost bored.

“Move. My turn.”

Benjamin stepped back without argument, breathing steadily, not even winded.

Lydia walked forward.

She was still in her silk robe. Her hair was loose around her shoulders. She looked beautiful and completely relaxed, like a woman who had just finished a pleasant evening and was tidying up before bed.

She crouched beside William and looked at his face for a moment, studying the blood, the swelling, the eye that was already closing from Benjamin's first blow.

Then she reached out and slapped him.

Not a wild slap. A precise, deliberate, open-palmed strike across his already broken lip that snapped his head to the side and reopened the cut across his mouth instantly.

She grabbed a fistful of his unwashed hair and wrenched his face back toward hers.

“You always thought someone would come for you,” she said quietly.

“Didn't you. Some part of you always believed that. That someone out there would notice. That someone would care.”

She pulled his hair tighter, forcing a broken sound out of him.

“Your father is dead. Your mother was dead before that. You have no brothers, no sisters, no cousins, no friends.” Her voice dropped to almost a whisper.

“You have nobody, William. Not one person in this world will ask where you went. Not one person will knock on this door and wonder why you stopped answering.” She released his hair and let his head drop.

“You will simply be gone. And the world will not notice for even one day.”

She stood, smoothed her robe, and walked to the bedside table.

She opened the small drawer and removed a single white pill and a glass of water. She carried both back to where William lay on the floor and crouched beside him again.

“Open your mouth,” she said gently.

William looked at the pill.

His vision was badly blurred. His ribs were broken. His head was bleeding in at least two places. But his mind was still working, and something about the particular gentleness of her voice in that moment sent a cold and complete understanding moving through him that was worse than any physical pain he had experienced that night.

“What are you trying to do Lydia,” he breathed.

Immediately Benjamin crouched on his other side. He grabbed William's jaw in one hand and forced it open without ceremony.

Lydia placed the pill on his tongue, tipped the water in, and held his mouth closed with one firm hand until he swallowed.

She set the glass down on the floor beside him with a small careful click.

Then she stood and looked down at him with her arms folded.

“That pill,” she said, “was supposed to regulate your heart. We made some adjustments to the formula.” She tilted her head.

“It will stop your heart completely. You have perhaps two minutes. Maybe a little less.”

Benjamin stood beside her and nodded once, satisfied, the way a man nods when a long project has finally been completed correctly.

“It will look natural,” Lydia continued.

“A man in your condition, with your history. No one will look twice at the report.” She paused.

“And as I said. No one will be asking questions to begin with.”

William stared up at both of them.

His chest was already tightening. He could feel it. Something shifting and contracting behind his ribs that had nothing to do with the beating.

He was not going to wait, he turned himself onto his stomach and began to crawl.

Slowly. Agonizingly. Dragging himself across the floor with his elbows, pulling his useless legs behind him, leaving a trail of blood across the hardwood. Every movement sent fresh waves of pain crashing through his broken ribs. His vision kept going dark and then pulling back.

But he kept moving.

Then he got four feet.

Benjamin's foot came down on his hand, William's face hit the floor. He looked up.

Both of them were standing over him. Lydia with her arms folded, her expression clean and finished. Benjamin with his foot still pressing down on William's hand, watching him with something between contempt and mild curiosity.

“Where exactly do you think you're going?” Benjamin said.