Blood, Rain, and Deceit
Blood, Rain, and Deceit
Alrigo Valerie King POV
The rain fell in unrelenting, freezing sheets, but the cold outside was nothing compared to the dead, hollow frost consuming my chest.
I stood at the edge of the open grave, staring down with eyes so dark, sunken, and bloodshot that I hardly recognized myself.
Dominic was in that mahogany box. My childhood friend. My brother in every way that mattered.
An agonizing knot tightened in my throat, choking off my air as the memory of seeing his body on the marble floor flashed behind my eyes. The sight of him—still, lifeless, his skin turned a sickening grey, his throat brutally crushed had torn something vital out of my chest.
A dozen of black umbrellas swayed around the open plot, keeping the downpour off my family and the gathered members of the syndicate.
The priest’s rhythmic chanting rose above the patter of the storm, uttering final ritual prayers for the dead, but the holy words sounded hollow, lost in the wind.
One by one, the family and inner-circle men stepped forward, taking a single white rose from the brass tray near the aisle.
They approached the casket, laid their flowers atop the polished wood, and offered a silent, stony nod to the dead before stepping back into the shadows.
Then a pair of polished leather boots stepped up beside me. My father.
His face was a mask of stone, devoid of a single drop of warmth or expression as he tossed a single white flower onto Dominic's casket.
He didn't look at the grave for more than a second. Instead, his sharp, unforgiving eyes turned toward me, glaring at my water-logged frame with pure, bitter disgust.
The raw, suffocating weight of that pain still burned behind my ribs, a sharp, unyielding agony that threatened to tear me apart from the inside out.
“Pathetic fool." my father hissed, his voice a low, gravelly curse that cut right through the noise of the rain.
He didn't wait for an answer. He brushed past my shoulder and walked out, leaving the sting of his words hanging in the air. I didn't blink.
I couldn't even summon the energy to do anything, because deep down, the accusation burned like acid.
I held my head as I felt life threatening pain. Because all I could hear was Dominic’s voice.
“You're risking everything, Alrigo. The empire, your status that you have built for years, everything.”
“Mark my words... that girl will bring us all to doom one day.”
I let out a painful laugh. Dominic always opposed it, always warned me.
It was my fault. Every single drop of blood spilled on that marble floor was on my hands.
I had let my guard down, let my heart soft-kill my instincts, and Dominic had paid the ultimate price for my arrogance.
The guilt clawed at my chest like jagged iron, twisting with every laboured breath, telling me the truth I couldn't escape: I killed him just as surely as if I had put my own hands around his throat.
The heavy clods of wet earth began to fall, hitting the mahogany lid with dull, hollow thuds that sounded like gunshots against the quiet of the rain.
Shovel after shovel, the dirt swallowed the coffin whole, burying my brother beneath feet of mud and stone until there was nothing left of him above ground.
Just a mound of dark, turned earth and a cold marble headstone bearing a name that should have lived for decades more.
One by one, the crowd began to disperse. The inner circle, the lieutenants, the capos…they turned on their heels, their black coats snapping in the wind as they filed toward the line of idling sedans.
None of them offered words of comfort.
As they passed me, standing drenched and immobile in the storm, their eyes cut through the freezing air like blades. Pure, unadulterated hatred and resentment burned in their glares.
They saw a boss whose judgment had faltered, a leader whose weakness had gotten their finest commander murdered.
I didn't flinch under their judgment. I deserved every poisonous look they threw my way.
Valentin stepped forward, extending a wide black umbrella over my head to shield me from the downpour. "Boss," he urged softly, "It's freezing. Let's get inside.”
I shoved his arm away with a cold, unyielding sweep of my hand, stepping further into the open storm.
The freezing rain pelted my face, soaking through my heavy coat, but I wanted it. I needed the stinging cold to burn away the suffocating heat trapped behind my ribs.
I wanted to stand in the mud until the cold seeped straight into my bones.
“What about the autopsy report…?” I asked him coldly.
"It's confirmed, Alrigo," Valentin said, "The strangulation and stabbing was the primary cause of death. The trachea and hyoid bone were completely crushed by high-impact, precise force. But the toxicology screen revealed something else…a delayed, paralytic neurotoxin was introduced through a deep blade wound."
A sharp, jagged spike of agony sliced clean through my chest.
"He was poisoned before he was choked, even the blade was dipped in toxin. It slowed his reaction time, making his limbs heavy before he was overpowered. But despite the poison, Dominic still managed to hit the emergency dial to warn us before he went down.”
The words hit me like an iron weight, driving the truth deeper into my bleeding soul.
Dominic had known he was dying…his body failing him in his final seconds and his only instinct had still been to protect the empire I had let crumble around us.
I dragged a ragged breath into my lungs, the ice-cold air burning in my throat, before I forced my gaze back up to Valentin.
"And the CCTV?”
"Destroyed," Valentin replied coldly. "The physical drives in the west wing were smashed, but the main server of the mansion was bypassed hours prior using a high-level spyware script. It looped the motion sensors and killed the silent alarm. It required primary administrative clearance."
He paused, letting the silence hang between us in the freezing rain before delivering the final blow.
"It has to be an insider job, Alrigo. There is no other way. Who else could gain access to something so vulnerable, so deeply guarded, if not an insider? It clearly shows Ivery and Rowan planned this from the very beginning. She fed him the security layouts and the clearance codes way before. She laid the groundwork for Rowan to ambush Dominic.”
The words tore through me, hot and suffocating.
Valentin exhaled a heavy, defeated breath, wiping the rain from his eyes, “Beyond that, Boss... we don't have clear evidences yet.”
A cold, dangerous calm washed over me, cutting through the agony in my chest like a sharpened blade. I stared back at him, my eyes hollow, unblinking, and deadly.
"Keep finding," I commanded, my voice dropping into a low, lethal whisper "Start investigating every fucking thing. I want timelines, digital footprints, and phone records, everything you can muster. I won't trust anyone until I find proof.”
Valentin’s jaw set firm. “Understood, Boss. I'll tear the estate apart until we have every shred of evidence.”
He turned on his heel, preparing to walk away, but the sharp pulse of suspicion in my chest made me speak before he could take two steps.
"Wait… keep a track on Julia, too. In fact everyone, even my family included. Leave no stone unturned.”
Valentin nodded solemnly, his expression unreadable. "Okay, Boss."
He lingered for a second, shifting his weight as he glanced toward the iron gates where the syndicate men were gathered, waiting.
“Boss…about Rowan's body, what do we do about it?”
I heaved a long, heavy sigh, the cold air burning in my chest as I closed my eyes, the image of Ivery's broken, tear-streaked face flashing behind my eyelids. It was only a lie.
One fucking lie.
"Prepare a burial for him, somewhere far outside the city limits." I commanded softly, the words barely carrying over the patter of the storm. "And yeah…keep it a secret.”
Valentin blinked, a rare flash of shock crossing his hardened features at the leniency, but he quickly bowed his head. "Understood, Boss.”
He turned and walked away.
I lifted my face, tilting my head back to look directly into the grey, weeping sky.
A dark, bitter sound escaped my throat, a harsh, ragged laugh that broke into the storm.
I laughed at the absurdity of it, at the sheer, tragic joke my life had become. I felt completely, utterly defeated.
Even through the suffocating agony of Dominic’s murder... even through the crushing weight of her treason... I couldn't do it. I couldn't unleash that final, savage desecration upon her brother's flesh.
How pathetic of me…I was still letting Ivery crush me again and again, shattering every piece of who I was.
I was a weak, spineless fool, still standing in the rain, extending mercy to the family of the woman who had ripped my heart out.