For what we were…for what we could have been…I tried one last time to reason with him, with the brother he could be if he wanted. “I didn’t ask to come first.”
“But you did. You always did. Father made sure of that. You had his full attention. It was you he was proud of. You who could do no wrong in his eyes. You were always his only heir.”
“You were there beside me.”
“I wasbehindyou. Always behind you. Do you know what that does to a man? Thirty years of standing in your shadow?”
“Don’t blame me for Father’s failings. I always treated you like an equal.”
“We were never equal,” he shouted as spittle formed in the corners of his mouth. “I was supposed to be first. It was all supposed to be mine.”
“Not anymore.”
He bared his teeth. “It’s not over yet,brother. You don’t have the balls to kill me. The moment you realize that I’m going to put a bullet in you. And then I’m going to fuck that whore you call a bride and then ki?—
I took the shot.
He collapsed, and I stood over him while blood—our shared blood—poured out.
He tried to get up, tried to fight it.
I put my foot on his chest, holding him down. I stared down into eyes so much like my own. “I warned you. It didn’t have to be this way.”
“You would have never given up the money. The legacy.” His voice was raspy as the blood pooling under him spread.
“If you had come to me. If you had walked in and said you wanted out. Wanted your own name, your own company, your own life built on something that was actually yours. I would have handed it over and never looked back.”
He stared up at me. His mouth opened. Closed.
I didn’t look away. I made myself hold it. Those eyes that were mirrors of my own. Thirty years of the same face looking back at me from a stranger.
His chest shuddered as he forced out the words. “Fuck you and your whore wife.”
"It was never about the money," I said. My voice came out quiet. Even. "I would have worked it out with you. But then you touched what was mine."
I raised the gun.
With that, I put a final bullet between his eyes and watched as the life faded from him.
Madison launched herself into my arms.
“It’s over,” I whispered against her hair. “Just like I promised.”
CHAPTER 63
MADISON
The storms had finally stopped.
It was sudden.
Not a tapering off of the rain but rather an abrupt departure.
As if Mother Nature had exhausted herself with the drama of it all.
Blue and red police lights flashed across my white dress.
I’d wiped the blood off my face, but splatters remained on the dress.
