Page 13 of Shattered In Darkness

You are a tool, Brody. That’s all. Emotion makes you weak. Focus on the work. It’s what you were bred for.

When I left three years ago, after the incident, I became my father’s personal puppet. A “fixer” apprentice. Trained to kill, to hunt, to watch, to stalk, to take out any information that could end my father. I make sure certain people stay loyal. If they don’t? I kill them.

It doesn’t just stay local though, I’ve had to take out people across the globe related to his filthy fucking business. My father has connections and enemies all around the country. I’ve travelled intensely over the past few years. Training, killing, collecting information, threatening the enemies, destroying information.

Ironically enough, his work collides with Lola’s stepfather, Marcus. My father is a well-known lawyer. Powerful, but incredibly shady. He uses his profession for leverage and control. People owe him favors, paperwork disappears, charges get reduced, evidence gets lost in cases, enemies get trapped in legal hell until they break.

The list goes on.

He said it would kill the grief. He said it would make me forget. I haven’t forgotten. In fact, the anger has augmented into something dangerous and violent.

It’s in my blood. It always will be.

I wouldn’t have come back, not for anything. But my father called, and when he calls, you listen. His instructions are precise. The old man rarely wastes words; he sends a location, a time, maybe a brief note about who needs to bleed and why. I go where I’m told and do what’s required. I’m the best at what I do, because I have nothing else.

Except the memory of her.

My phone buzzes in my pocket, screen lighting up with a message from Richard. I rarely call him dad anymore.

All done?

Me: Yes

I don’t specify; he knows I will get it done. That’s what he trained me to do. Like a loyal dog.

Good, Son. I won’t be home tonight. Please make sure Sophie eats dinner.

I put the phone in my pocket, and head towards home. Once I arrive, I pause outside the house. My reflection stares back from the glass: jaw set, eyes hollow, suit immaculate. The Observer. My father’s creation. I barely recognize my own face anymore.

My hand tightens on the doorknob as I let myself in, reminding myself, over and over: Lola is the enemy. Lola is the reason my mother’s dead. Lola is the sickness spreading through me, making me weak, making me want.

Enemy. Disease. Poison.

But fuck, the thought of her still wrecks me. Still owns me.

I will not let her win again.

Not this time.

The door clicks shut behind me and I let the quiet settle. My father’s house is a shrine to efficiency. There’s no clutter, no mess, nothing left out of place.

Sophie’s in the kitchen. I can see her from the foyer, pretending not to notice me at first. She’s slicing something, her hands steady, eyes down. Always the peacekeeper. Always bracing for aftershocks. I watch for a moment, unmoving. She must sense me, because the knife stalls mid-slice.

“You’re home,” she says, chin tucked, like she’s working out how dangerous I might be tonight.

“Yeah.” I let my shoes fall heavily on the wood as I move in. “I said I’d be.”

I keep it neutral. Controlled. The version of me Sophie can handle. Civilized, patient, not the thing that wants to tear down walls, to gnaw the world to the bone just to get to Lola.

Sophie glances up, eyes warm, scanning for wounds. “How was the trip?”

I almost laugh. The trip? She means the kill. The job. The reason I exist. “Same as always.” I pull out a barstool, toss my jacket over the back. “Tiresome. Clients suck. Dad’s got me on new shit already.”

She nods, lips pressed tight. No questions; she’s too smart for that. Part of me appreciates her caution, the way she tiptoes around the wound at the center of this family. She’ll never touch it, never dig, just smooth everything over with careful words and soft hands.

“You eating?” I ask to fill the space.

She hesitates, then pushes her hair behind her ear. “I can make something. It’s really no trouble…”