*Flashback*
Andrew's POV
My hands shook as I dialed Jack's number again and again. No answer. I called Emma — she said Jack never showed up at school. My stomach twisted into a knot.
Police sirens echoed somewhere in the city that afternoon, but I barely noticed. All I could hear was the buzz of my phone, the same message burning in my mind.
Unknown : Your brother is going to die.
"Who are you?" I finally texted back. "What do you want from him?"
No reply. Just the pulsing dots that never formed words.
Hours passed before the next message came in.
Check your messages. You'll understand why.
Attached was an old photograph — my father, standing beside a teenager I didn't recognize at first. Then it hit me. Oliver. My dad's protégé, the boy he treated like the son he never had. The son before me.
Jack's POV
I woke up in a cold, damp warehouse. My wrists were tied, and my head pounded. I could still taste the sharp chemical on my tongue.
"Hello?" I called out, voice trembling.
A man stepped out of the shadows — early thirties, dark eyes, calm in a terrifying way.
"Jack," he said smoothly, "you look just like your father."
"I don't even know you," I stammered. "What do you want from me?"
He smiled slightly. "You don't. But your father knew me very well. He promised me a future — then took it away when he chose your brother instead."
Oliver's words were cold, measured, like each word had been rehearsed for years.
"He turned his back on me," Oliver continued. "Threw me out when I needed him most. While you two grew up in that big house, I spent years surviving on nothing. So now, I'm taking back what was stolen."
Tears burned Jack's eyes. "Please… whatever happened between you and Dad, I don't—"
A gun clicked. The sound froze him in place.
"This isn't about you," Oliver whispered. "You're just the beginning."
A single shot echoed through the warehouse.
Andrew's POV
Three hours later, I was at the police station when they found him — near the old bus depot, the one Dad used to take us to as kids. The irony cut deep; Oliver had left him there on purpose.
I collapsed when they told me. My brother, the loud, stubborn kid who always teased me for being "goody two-shoes," was gone. Tears streamed down my face as realisation slapped me in the face.
I looked again at the last text message.
You'll understand why.
And I did. Oliver didn't kill Jack out of cruelty alone. He wanted to destroy my dead father's legacy — while me and jack were the only family left for each other.It was revenge, delivered in the cruelest way possible.
That night, I made a promise: Who ever did this wouldn't get away with this. Not while I was still breathing.