When it took over, I didn’t exist anymore. Just the rage. Sharp, merciless, and utterly detached. Verbal tirades, physical destruction—nothing was off-limits.
I wasn’t the Hulk. The Hulk turned back into someone decent.
Me? I stayed wrecked.
Eventually, my brothers would drag me out of it—sometimes with brute force, sometimes by treating me like a toddler having a meltdown. I hated that more than the rest. Their pity.
Things would slowly begin to register, and the first thing I would notice would be that look in my brothers’ eyes.
Irritation, exhaustion. And the worst—pity.
Then, they’d hang around for a while, making sure I was “okay.” They’d even altered their schedules since “the incident” to ensure I was never alone at the house. They’d changed their lives to accommodate me.
The doctors told me the symptoms I was experiencing were consistent with traumatic brain injuries. The rage, confusion, blocks in memory, damage to my fine motor skills—all normal and would subside within six months to a year.
Ayear.
I, the oldest Steele brother and heir to the Steele family fortune, had become a drain on the family.
No one said it out loud, but my role as CEO of Steele Shadows was in limbo. Days that used to be spent catering to clients and bar hopping were now filled with manual labor—fence mending, field work, whatever I could find to remind myself that I still had purpose. That I could stilldosomething.
Then the sun would fall. And the dark would come.
Sleepless, endless, brutal nights. I’d pace for hours, eyes locked on the mountains, waiting for daylight. Waiting for something that felt likemeagain. Then I’d wake up and do the only thing I knew. I worked. I pushed past it. Mind over matter. Out here, alone in the woods, swinging a hammer, where I could pretend I was still whole.
A swift gust of wind kicked me off balance. A distantcrackhad my head lifting, the sound echoing through the woods around me. I glanced up at the pine tree above me, its branches bending with the weight of the rain. Branches were beginning to break.
I positioned another nail on the wood, noticing the throbbing prickles at my fingertips. I drew the hammer back and connected but the nail didn’t split the wood. Again, and again. The nail didn’t budge.
The damn thing wouldn’t budge.
I checked the tip of the nail like an idiot. Yep, it was sharp.
I cleared my throat, a murmuring commentary telling me to keep my cool. With a slight inhale, I repositioned the nail, blew out the breath, then slammed it again. This time the hammer tumbled out of my hand, landing on my boot.
I surged to my feet, lips snarling to stifle a scream. My breath came out in rapid puffs of steam around my head. I began to pace to release the energy building inside me. Pacing, pacing, pacing, I squeezed my hands into fists, talking myself off the ledge.
I can do this, I told myself.
I can do this, I can do this, I can do this…
Clenching my jaw, I plucked the hammer from the muddy ground, kneeled back down at the fence and pounded that damn nail until it went in. Seconds faded into minutes, minutes faded into an hour as I worked on that fence, all rational thought replaced by the need to meet my goal. To finish what I’d started—which should have taken twenty minutes.
Twilight faded into an inky blackness, the rain a deluge as I hammered nail after nail, picking up the hammer each time it slipped from my weak grip to start again.
I would not give up.
I’d removed my jacket sometime after the first half hour, welcoming the precipitation against my skin. I had tunnel vision. Nothing else mattered other than mending that damn fence, a normal job for old Phoenix, a challenging one for new Phoenix.
I was into my third hour when a familiar snort pulled me from my focus, a big, black nose nudging my shoulder. I set down my hammer and turned to Spirit, my four-year-old Arabian horse. Her milky white body seemed to glow through the darkness.
“You find what you went looking for?”
Another snort.
“Good.” I stroked her coal-black mane, slick with rain, and found myself picturing Rose Flower’s hair.
“Got a little chilly on us tonight, didn’t it, girl?” I glanced at the fence, then back at Spirit.
