When control slips

When control slips

Edward’s POV

The sun was mean that afternoon, making my club always seem like it was attempting to blind me whenever I swung it.

“Nice swing, Ed!” Martin yelled from a distance, his voice dripping with that fake cheer it always had.

I gave him a lazy smile and lined up my next shot. The ball sat there on the tee, innocent, patient. My shoulders rolled back; I inhaled and swung—clean, sharp. The sound of impact cracked through the air. The ball soared high, slicing through sunlight before disappearing down the course.

“Still got it,” I muttered, brushing invisible dust from my gloves.

The other man, Lewis, chuckled behind me. “Retirement isn’t in your dictionary, is it, Ed?”

“Not while the world keeps needing me,” I replied, turning to face them with a smirk. They smiled back in unison, only I knew it wasn't a sincere one. They hate seeing me brag, but I love making them feel that way. Useless.

We were just about to move to the next hole when I spotted Maverick walking toward me from the far end of the course.

My gut tightened. What is it this time? Hopefully, it's no bad news.

I raised a finger to Martin and Lewis. “Gentlemen, give me a moment.”

They nodded, though Martin’s eyes followed Maverick with mild curiosity. Maverick looked tense, too tense for a man on payroll. He stopped a few feet from me, lowering his voice as if the wind could have ears.

“Sir,” he said, his tone crisp but uneasy.

I didn’t bother with greetings. “Talk.”

He swallowed, looked down briefly, then met my eyes again. “It’s about Clara Vance.”

My jaw flexed. “What about her?”

“She’s been taken care of.”

“When?”

“Last night.”

I smirked and took a slow breath, staring past him, past the green, past the golf course itself. Just feeling that satisfying silence that revolve around you when you make history again.

“And the item?” I asked, a fading smile still tugged at my face.

He hesitated. Just half a second too long.

I turned back to him, eyes narrowing. “The item, Maverick." My tone was now laced with anger. "Did you retrieve it?”

He shifted his weight, fingers twitching near his belt. “No, sir.”

I didn’t wait to think. My hand acted earlier than my mind did.

Paa!

The slap landed hard on his cheeks, the sound echoing through the open field. His head jerked to the side.

Martin and Lewis looked up from the distance, startled. I raised my hand slightly, as if waving off a fly, and they quickly turned away, pretending not to see.

Maverick touched his face, eyes wide but defiant.

“You lost it?” I said, my voice low and shaking with fury. “You lost the one goddamn thing that could destroy everything I’ve built?”

He stammered, “I’m… I'm sorry sir, we tried our best but…”

The ground felt unsteady beneath my feet. I dropped my club and smacked a hand on my chest. It was that sharp pain again… like someone had hooked a knife under my ribs and was trying to pry my heart out. I took a step backward, air clawing at my lungs.

“Sir?” Maverick rushed forward, trying to steady me.

I shoved his hand away. “Don’t touch me.”

The pain throbbed again, I bent slightly whilst tightening my grip on my chest. Stupid pain.

After a while, I straightened and forced a breath through my teeth. “You had one job,” I said. “One goddamn job, and you couldn’t even...”

“I tried, sir,” he said quickly. “I did. But there was someone else helping her.”

That made me pause. “Helping her?”

“Yes, sir.” He nodded once, nervous. “They got to her first, and she handed something to the person before she died.”

I stared at him, my pulse pounding. “And who is this person?”

“I don’t know. We couldn’t get a clear view, because the face was fully covered, and they both fought...”

Paa!

Another slap landed across his face before he could even blink. This one was harder, sharper and angrier.

He stumbled back, clutching his cheek. His eyes burned with humiliation, but he didn’t speak.

“Do you realize what you’ve done?” I hissed. “If that card—if that video—falls into the wrong hands, everything crumbles. Do you understand that?”

He said nothing.

I stepped closer, my shadow swallowing him. “Clara Vance was a leak. She knew more than she should’ve. I gave you simple instructions—contain, retrieve, eliminate. And yet here you are, feeding me excuses.”

“I’ll find it,” he managed to say. “I’ll find whoever has it, I swear.”

“You’d better.” I jabbed a finger into his chest. “Because if I hear one whisper of that evidence reaching the media, you won’t have a grave to be buried in.”

He nodded quickly. “Understood, sir.”

“Good.”

I turned my back on him, trying to still the tremor in my fingers. My chest still ached, but I refused to let it show. Pain was a weakness. And weakness got men killed — I’d learned that the hard way.

Behind me, Maverick waited for dismissal, tense like a soldier before execution.

I looked over my shoulder. “Get out of my sight. Don’t come back until you have what I want.”

“Yes, sir.”

He left, his footsteps crunching on the gravel.

For a moment, I stood there alone, the air humming with the faint sound of distant laughter from the other players. It was absurd how easily the world moved on — as if my empire wasn’t one wrong move away from collapsing.

I bent down, picked up my club again and began moving towards their direction.

Martin’s voice cut through the distance again. “Everything okay, Ed?”

I straightened, forcing a smile. “Just business, boys. Just business.”

They laughed because they thought that they were only watching a boss reprimanding an employee. No one suspected anything darker, and that is what made me a good player in this game.

I set my next shot, and gazed down at the little white ball as if it had personally offended me. I inhaled, exhaled, and swung. The strike was strong, but it was slightly misdirected; the ball going right rather than straight.

Figures.

I saw it disappear into the distance, my hands clenched on the club in more than the necessary grip.

I gnashed my teeth. Clara Vance. That damn woman. She thought she could hide forever. I feel so satisfied that she's gone now, even though she left me with another rat to deal with.

Someone else has the memory card now. Something that could destroy years of my patient building.

I looked up at the horizon, and there, the trees hung listlessly in the heat of the afternoon. Even if anyone believes they can beat me, I said to myself, they do not know me.

The world may assume that Edward Reyes is a simple businessman who has money, power and a perfect smile. But there under the charm, under the headlines, I was more... I was something that had been constructed to endure all the storms.

And I wasn’t done yet.