Page 5 of Overkill

“Ian, not a word of this to your parents until we get forensics back, alright?” Captain Lyons said. The kid straightened, wiping the back of his palm across his mouth. “I don’t want to get them worked up until we know for sure. And…maybe you should take the day off, too.”

Chapter 2

A Hot Beverage

Melody

Since I was a little girl, I’d always known I’d spend my life arguing with men. Young, old, it didn’t matter. It struck me early in childhood how wrong their entire gender was, and how confidently so they were. It started in the fifth grade with Joshua Wintour Gray, a classmate trying to tell me Jesus was white.

Even then, I knew a man from the Middle East was unlikely to look like an Italian blue-eyed fashion model, but he stood firm. My teacher, Mr. Nell-Gray, sent me to the principal’s office for upsetting Joshua with something as simple as the truth, and I discovered facts could hurt feelings.

So, I decided to hurt as many people as I could—out of spite—because stupidity did not deserve to be coddled. That was why I always hated the Grays. I never understood why Mom allied herself with them in marriage; they had money, sure. But so what?

It was too bad I wouldn’t become a lawyer now.

Though I did hear the bar exam could be taken even if I were incarcerated…

For now, my skills were limited to sparring with a hormonal teenager going through some serious shit at home.

“Photography is lame!” Marcus said, rolling his eyes so hard it was audible. Impressive.

Milk-soaked cornflakes scattered when he slammed his hand on the linoleum kitchen table—the second replacement of the expensive hardwood one that had had broken eight years ago.

The first time I said no. The first time I tried to stop him. Luke.

Gray-silver light glowed from the windows, but the yellow lamps were still on to help with the darkness. We’d had weeks of rain, and I needed to go into the creepy basement soon to make sure our sump pumps still worked, or we risked flooding.

I couldn’t handle that right now.

There were so much to do around the house. Half the furniture was old, broken, or threadbare. I needed to dust, repaint the walls and the baseboards, and one of the living room windows was held together by duct tape while waiting to be replaced. It’d have to wait for a while.

And this damn table…This stupid fucking breakfast table had to go.

I still felt the wood splintering on my shoulder from when I was thrown into it. The way it split beneath me as I crashed to the ground, my shoulder pulled from its socket, and my forearm broken.

“Marcus!” Miriam wiped milk splatters from her plaid vest, her two long braids swaying with the movement. “Ew!”

Marc and I used to get into heated arguments that were always resolved by sitting on the couch, sock-covered feet up on the coffee table, silently watching a show together while leaning against each other. An apology. A silent declaration of sibling affection. Arguments long forgotten. But it was different now. The three of us used to like each other. Me, and my half-brother and sister.

Now I was supposed to take the place of a parent. A guardian. Stepping into a vacancy I created that frigid day on Mourningkill Lake, when the man who had given Marcus his eyes slipped into the cold, inky depths.

I bit my tongue, taking a breath before responding, because I swallowed my retorts. My complaints about wasted food, wasted money. Both were scarce in this house.

Because this lack of excess was my fault. Not just my failure to provide while working nights for customer service at an insurance company, but because I was a killer. And I hated the position I had put us in.

But I did not hate myself for ending a bad man, the sad excuse for a father, before he had a chance to hurt the two fresh-faced teens sitting at the cheap kitchen table. He ruined me. But these two still had a chance.

I stared at the green folding table. Four years ago, the yellow linoleum one had shattered during one of Marcus’ tantrums. Like father, like son…sometimes. So much broken, replaced furniture, broken by people’s uncontrollable rage.

I needed to save Marcus from becoming…him. Marc’s a good kid. He has a good soul. He just needed to work on his anger, but I didn’t know where to start.

“Lacrosse is way better. Larsonn says it’s the best! And…and…” He leaned forward, switching from petulance to pleading. “It’s my dream! Come on, Mel!”

I drank my coffee, stomach grumbling with hunger. I’d go out to the garden and make a cucumber salad later.

Larsonn Gray. Their cousin.

I tried to hide the growing bitterness at the reminder of their existence.