Children of Redemption (Children of Vice 3)

For a smartass, he was such a dumbass sometimes.

“Why don’t you provoke him? Why don’t you push back?” I asked.

He frowned. “I would if he was wrong! Don’t you see—”

“No, I don’t see! I’m told. This or that. Now I want to see…I want to see if he’ll keep to his word…if he’ll really kill me.” I grinned up at Ethan before splashing the rest of the water on my face.

“Wyatt,” he said in his warning voice…the one he used on the fucking guards.

Rising back up to my feet…without him…I placed my hands on his shoulders. “Big brother…it’s no fun working inside the rules. Dad might be right…or maybe…just maybe even he doesn’t know what he’d do.”

“So your plan is what? Cause chaos until he kills you?”

“Want to take bets?” I grinned so wide my cheeks hurt.

Ethan shook me off his shoulder, moving away from me, but not before saying, “Dead men don’t pay.”

“Fuck, you are annoying.” But I wasn’t going to ruin this. If our father couldn’t kill me…that meant no one could…this was going to be fun.

Let the games begin…

WYATT – NOW

Let the games begin. That’s what I thought. That’s how I saw all of this…as a game. And like all gamers, I only wanted to fight the best. I wanted a challenge; I wanted to stand on the edge of danger. I was a child…I didn’t see what my father…what my brother saw. What I really wanted was to fight death. I was angry. I was, as my father said, broken. And I wanted to fight the thing that broke me—death. My mother’s death. In my mind, my father was the only thing that seemed close enough to that. Maybe that’s why, not even three months from that day, death came to show me it was bigger than even my father…that it didn’t care what I wanted and what I felt. It took what it wanted when it wanted. Mother’s death broke me; my father’s death scared me. His death proved I was weak. I couldn’t win. I would never win…. not like that. That’s the real reason I became a doctor. I didn’t give a shit about other people. This wasn’t about other people. It was about me and death, me stealing victory out of its hands. In all honestly, I didn’t even see the people in between.

“Sir…Sir?”

I glanced over my shoulder at Greyson, who stood in front of my closet door. Again, he repeated, “Forgive me, sir, I knocked a few times and got no answer.”

I stared for a few seconds, still baffled by how he called me sir. Without sarcasm or annoyance, but with respect.

“It’s fine. What is it?” I asked, as I clasped the button at my wrist.

He lifted a file, an old-school yellow folder with far too much paper in it. “The boss has paperwork to sign but…”

“But?” I questioned, grabbing my suit jacket off the hanger and slipping it on, adjusting the shoulders. He just looked at me like I was supposed to read his bloody mind. Then again, only an idiot wouldn’t know what he was thinking. He was thinking how in the hell was he supposed to go see his boss, my brother, and talk about work as if the man hadn’t only just witnessed his wife’s murder…it had barely been one full day. It was only logical that he would think that. It was what any logical person would think. However, my family made it a habit not to think like everyone else. As my father would say, to rule over the sheep, you can’t be among the sheep. And because my mother got a kick out of proving my father wrong, she would say of course you could, as long as the sheep didn’t realize you were a wolf.

Dear God, I’m mentally quoting my parents now…

“Sir...?”

“Ugh…This shit is going to get annoying really quick,” I grumbled while walking over to him and taking the file, looking him dead in the eyes. “Greyson, how long have you known my brother?”

“Almost twelve years now…”

“So why the fuck are you acting like a virgin in front of me?” Taking the file, I smacked the side of his head. “No wonder Ethan thinks he’s a damn god. I would too with how easy it is to fool you people.”

His eyebrows came together, and I’m was positive that there were little men in his head running around going error, error cannot compute. “Let me help you think before you give yourself an aneurysm…. What do they call my brother?”

Silence. He didn’t form a reply.

I waved my hand slowly, hoping it would jump-start his mind. “But you and I both know who he truly is ….do you think that a woman he hasn’t even known for a half a year would change who he’s been for the last twenty-eight years? You truly think that it’s just a coincidence he married a woman related to the Flanagan brothers, giving him the perfect opportunity to go to Boston and take back what is his, destroy their whole entire family, and not even two weeks later she is murdered right in front of him…where he grieves for all the world to see…” I laughed, shaking my head at that. “The man had her cremated not even three hours later… There is no funeral… Dona is rushing back home… You all see him and think, ‘Oh, the lion must be licking his

wounds’…not realizing he’s licking the blood off his palms. He used Ivy to get to the Flanagans…what makes you think he wouldn’t kill Ivy to get to his enemies, Greyson?” I saw the gears turning slowly in his head and went on, “Because I’m so kind, and Ethan has you working for me, I’ll give you this little piece of advice. It might save your life one day…stop thinking my brother is normal. Be afraid when you see him. But be mortified when you don’t.”

“Am I interrupting?”

I didn’t even bother looking back. I knew who it was. Grinning, I placed my arm around Greyson’s shoulder. It was impossible, but I could have sworn I felt his body temperature drop, forcing us to both turn around.