Page 86 of Seizing Control: Part One

Can’t relate...

“Also wanted to let you know that I’m gonna do my best to make you a big brother. Gonna make sure they know about you—gonna start talkin’ about you finally. Figure it’s time—figure it’s the least you deserve. A man for a dad instead of the coward I’ve been for more than a decade.”

Touching two fingers to my lips, I scoot forward and press them to the cold marble. “Love you, son. I’ll be back again in two months—by choice this time, even though we both know she’d march my arse up here like she does every year if I dared to try and skip out on you.”

The emotion that’s wedged in my throat makes me lightheaded as I push back to my feet. I stumble over to Jenna’s side, unzipping my jeans as I go. The carton of beer I’ve consumed makes itself known as I turn my back to my son’s resting place to shield him from what I’m about to do. My cold fingers grasp my dick, then I let go a stream of piss all over Jenna’s grave marker.

I’ve always wanted to do this but haven’t had the opportunity.

My duchess would kill me if she saw me now.

Desecrating a gravesite, even though she hates Jenna almost as much as I do.

“Rest in hell, bitch.” Perverse delight floods me as I concentrate the stream on the spot where I imagine her head would be. “Hope you’re gettin’ everything you deserve down there.”

After rezipping my pants, I knock one of the memorial vases off the end of her marble slab with my foot. I grind the porcelain into dust beneath my heel. There’s a bounce in my step as I blow my son one final kiss, then head for my Range Rover. I’m not sure where I’m going to go, probably the compound since that’s been my hiding place lately.

I haven’t been home in four days.

Can’t bring myself to face my wife.

Not after the way I lobbed the truth at her.

At least, I have an excuse for remaining gone tonight. Cherub deserves to spend the evening with our family and friends without my presence casting a shadow over the celebration. I know my duchess. She’ll be putting her best face forward, tamping down on the anxiety and hurt she’s feeling, determined to make everyone else happy. With her favourite girls in town, I can only hope they’re able to help her find peace and clarity in the midst of the carnage that’s to come.

Starting with the formal wedding in front of the Trinity on Saturday afternoon.

Ending with hell on earth when she awakens on Sunday to a world where Ezekiel Miles no longer exists.

“Lucky motherfucker.” The fact that Venom gets to slip off into the abyss as a hero while leaving me to deal with the broken-hearted woman he’s deceiving enrages me to the point of madness. He gets to inflict the pain, then soothe it when he returns from the dead. All I receive for staying true to Cherub is borrowed time and my wife’s hatred for lying to her. “Wouldn’t know second place if it smacked ya in the face.”

My angry mutterings at my absent ex-best friend are loud in the clear night.

If anyone could see me now, they’d have me committed.

Stumbling around a cemetery, drunk on beer, and fuelled by injustice.

I’m a bumbling mess in search of a soft place to face plant.

When a few more black birds take flight and it becomes clear that something has disturbed them, I sober up quickly, and pull my handgun from its holster. Muzzle pointed at the ground, I carefully trudge down the path that leads back to my vehicle. The hair on the back of my neck lifts when I become aware of voices.

I spy at least a dozen figures standing next to my Rover.

When I get close enough to make out their words, I sigh.

Seems my club brothers have found me.

“Go and check on him,” Cub tells Hunter.

In the moonlight, I make out my brother shaking his head. “He’ll find us in his own time.”

“What I wanna know is this—why the fuck have I been dragged out to a graveyard in the middle’o the night?” Diablo gripes.

“Yeah, we were promised fun,” his nephew, Kaleb, adds.

“Exactly.” Another of the Blackards MMA fighter’s, Jep, nods. “That means strippers and snortin’ Hunter’s latest experiment, not tombstones.”

“Slash’d kill us if we took him to see strippers,” Toker tells them. A cloud of smoke erupts from his mouth. He passes the joint to Diablo, then shoves his hands in his pockets and heads my way. “Skulkin’ around in the shadows, are we?”

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