Vengeance Read Online Free Page B

lay my right hand on the edge of the open portion. My fingers curled and felt the lining inside. With this one hand anchoring me, I moved my eyes along the arm and up the shoulder until I was looking at my older brother’s face.
    My eyes swam as they traced the features of the face in front of me. Was my vision blurry? The face I saw did not belong to Aiden. It wasn’t him. It wasn’t my brother. The face had been so disfigured then pressed back into shape as if it were putty with no bones beneath. This could not be my brother. My handsome brother with his dashing smile. This could not be what remained of him. This was a mannequin or a wax likeness. It was not my brother.
    But… yes, it was. It was Aiden. The mortician had done what he could to restore his face, but had been unable to achieve its natural glory. Like seeing a grotesque, mangled mass of steel that had once been your pristine Corvette, unable to imagine the collision that could compress it to this heap. Still, you catch glimpses of its original form, hints of what it used to be. Those distinct features are familiar enough that you could pick it out of a parking lot full of doppelgangers.
    So how much more could you still recognize your own brother, even maligned this way?
    When I admitted it was truly Aiden, I leaned over the casket to breathe my farewell. In moments, the casket would be closed and Aiden would be removed from the world forever. I began to shake. I would never see my brother again. I shook so hard that the casket trembled. All the same, I dared not let go for fear of collapsing.
    I tried to subdue the tremors. Past the foot of the casket a group of people were watching me. Afraid I would pull the casket down. Astonished at the sight of me withstanding that onslaught. Beyond them, the doors to the hearse. I stared at Aiden through my tears, shuddering as every word I would never be able to say to him imploded within me. Ten thousand battalions of artillery firing faster than a string of firecrackers. Every future moment worth taking a picture of and sending to my brother, obliterated.
    When the seizure passed, I let go, stepped back from the casket, and whispered one last time, “I love you, Aiden.”
    I left through the back of the chapel, where still more onlookers had congregated. They parted to let me through and I looked each one of them in the eyes, unabashed by my tears. This is what it is to love and lose someone. It is not black suits and muted ties. It is not politely folded hands and lowered heads. It is fierce. It is violent. It is losing composure without caring about appearances. It is untimely and inconsolable. It is angry and afraid.
    Outside, the air was lifeless. I couldn’t sense cold on my skin because my whole body was numb. My legs quivered as I walked to my car.
    “Ethan,” Paige said, descending the steps toward me. “Are you all right?”
    “Yeah,” I said. I unlocked the door, but stopped before getting in. “No. No, I’m not all right. Aiden is dead. How the fuck did this happen?”
    “I know,” she said. “I know. But there are some things you should hear. Where are you staying? I’ll call you later.”
    “Things I should hear?”
    “I don’t want to talk about it now.”
    She looked over her shoulder as if to check that the men lingering at the top of the mortuary’s steps had not drawn closer.
    “Talk about what? I have no clue what you’re telling me.”
    She intercepted the car door as I slipped into the driver’s seat. I was anxious to get away from that place and this woman who was starting to strike me as unbalanced.
    “Aiden didn’t die in a motorcycle accident,” she said. “He was killed.”
    Her words stunned me. I failed to blink or breathe for several seconds. After all I had just endured, now this woman I had never met was feeding me some delusion about how Aiden died? I had no more reason to trust her than any of the strangers on my flight the night before.
    I didn’t know how