Virgin Dot Com Novel

[Liam's POV] The black limousine pulled up to Cadence Records, and my body betrayed me. Hands went cold. Throat constricted. The same shutdown I'd experienced at fourteen when Mom's funeral ended and Dad decided grief required discipline. I'd know that car anywhere. Custom-built tomb on wheels that delivered Jackson Blackwood to places he wanted to conquer. My father had returned. "Fuck," Asher said behind me. He'd seen it too. Finn moved to the window, and I felt his tension. Three boys who'd learned survival through hypervigilance. Reading moods. Anticipating displeasure.

Contorting ourselves into shapes that might finally be good enough. I watched Jackson exit the limo, and the years hadn't diminished him. Gray at the temples that made him distinguished instead of old. The same magnetic pull that drew young women into his orbit. Fifteen years of watching him fuck girls barely older than we'd been when Mom died. Each one younger than the last. Like he was trying to screw his way back to the age she'd been when they met. "He looks good," Finn said flatly. "Europe obviously agreed with him." "Fucking his way through Europe, you mean," Asher corrected.

My office door opened without knocking. Jackson Blackwood didn't ask permission to occupy space. He simply took it. "Boys." Not men. Not sons. Boys. Diminishment wrapped in greeting. I was thirty now. A man who ran a multi-million dollar company. And one hug from my father reduced me to fourteen years old. "So that's her," Jackson said, studying the empty doorway. "Ordinary. I expected something more impressive, given the havoc she's caused." Asher's hands clenched into fists. Finn's jaw went tight. I felt my own rage rising because what could we do? He was our father.

The source of our funding, our power. The calculation itself was the problem. That my first instinct was to weigh consequences instead of immediately defending the woman I loved. "She's not-" I started, but he cut me off with a dismissive gesture. "Don't defend her to me. I'm here to clean up your mess, not validate your poor judgment." "We're handling it," I said, and heard the defensiveness. The little boy voice. He moved to my desk. Not the conference table. My desk. Settled into my chair with ease. The symbolism was surgical. This was still his office, his company, his kingdom.

"Show me the damage." So we did. Laid out financial reports while he examined them with clinical detachment. Three major artists gone. Two contracts cancelled. Stock hemorrhaging forty percent. Millions bleeding out because we'd chosen Jasmine over reputation. "You turned your mother's legacy into tabloid entertainment." His voice was surgical. "Everything she died believing you'd protect. Reduced to speculation about which of her sons is fucking the same piece of ass." Then the knock came. Three measured taps. Asher moved to the door, and I watched his face as he opened it.

Saw the warning in his eyes. She entered carrying the coffee, and every muscle in my body went taut. Four sets of eyes tracked her movement across the room. I felt Finn's coiled readiness beside me. Asher's controlled fury. My own heart hammering. Jasmine set the coffee in front of him with steady hands, and I was already halfway to standing when his hand shot out. Lightning fast. His fingers closed around her thigh. Not gentle. Not accidental. Possessive. Claiming. Time fractured. I stopped breathing.

All available mental resources were consumed by the sight of my father's hand on Jasmine's thigh. By the casual ownership in that grip. "You need to wear shorter skirts," he said, and his eyes locked on mine. Not on her. On me. On us. Making sure we watched. "If you're going to play the part, at least look it." The words detonated in my skull. He was calling her a whore. To her face. To our faces. While touching her. While demonstrating that he could violate what we loved and we would sit here and calculate consequences. My body moved before my brain finished processing. Half-standing.

Protective instinct finally overriding the trained hesitation. But Asher's hand caught my arm. Iron grip. Restraining. Because he saw what I'd forgotten in that moment of rage-that attacking our father meant destroying everything. And the fact that I needed restraining was its own condemnation. That my first impulse hadn't been immediate violence. That there'd been a split-second gap. A microsecond of calculation. That hesitation was the failure. I felt Finn move beside me. Asher stepping forward, hands already clenched into weapons.

Three men who wanted blood and were being held back by conditioning deeper than bone. But Jackson just raised one hand. Stop. And we froze. The shame of it was acid in my veins. That single gesture and we stopped. Despite being grown men. Despite having our own power. He was still our father, still the source. Still the god we'd spent fifteen years pretending we didn't still worship. I watched Jasmine's face-saw the moment she stopped breathing. The way her body went rigid under his touch. Then she moved; reached down with steady hands and removed his hand from her thigh.

"Anything else, sir?" Her voice came out steady. The professionalism of it hollowed me out. She'd armored herself because she'd learned that protection wasn't guaranteed. That survival meant taking care of yourself. Jackson smirked. First hint of approval. "That's all." She walked out with her head up, and I watched every step. Watched her maintain composure while his sons sat there like trained animals. The weight of my own inadequacy was physical. In the moment that mattered, I'd hesitated. Had calculated. Had been my father's son before her protector. And she'd seen it. Had felt us freeze.

Had been forced to save herself. The shame of that was its own kind of death. The second the door closed, I turned on him. "Don't fucking touch her." He raised an eyebrow. Amused. "Or what? You'll do what, exactly?" The question hung between us, and we all knew the answer. Nothing. We'd do nothing immediate enough to matter. "Sit down," he said. Command, not suggestion. And we sat. Because we'd been trained to sit. Because fifteen years of conditioning didn't dissolve just because we'd finally found something worth fighting for. "Now," Jackson said, settling back in my chair.

"Let's talk about how I'm going to save your mother's company." He pulled documents from his briefcase. Spread them across my desk. "I have connections. I can restore contracts. Bring artists back. Stabilize stock." He looked at each of us in turn. "But there are conditions." My chest tightened. Nothing good ever followed "but there are conditions" from Jackson Blackwood's mouth. "I want to know if she's worth it." The pause was calculated. "Let Jasmine work with me. Personally. The same way she works with you." The words landed but my brain refused to process them.

"In the office," he continued, voice casual. "And in the bedroom." The detonation was internal. Visceral. Nausea rising from somewhere primal. Rage and horror and something worse-recognition. He was asking us to pimp out the woman we loved to our own father as the price of saving our mother's legacy. "Get out." My voice came from somewhere outside my body. Flat. Empty. "Get the fuck out of my office before I put my hands on you. Before I prove I'm exactly the disappointment you've always thought I was by beating my father bloody in his dead wife's office." Virgin Dot Com