PART 1: The Invitation
The message came at 3:12 p.m.
"Tonight. 7:00. My place."
No greeting. No explanation. Just that. And a digital signature: —A.R.
Jack stared at the screen until it dimmed, thumb hovering. He didn't reply. What the hell was there to say?
He sat in the back booth of Greely's Tap — the kind of place where the lighting did most of the lying. A lone beer sweated in front of him, untouched. A man two stools down was coughing hard into his fifth bourbon, while some twenty-something behind the bar flipped through a cracked phone with the detachment of someone who'd already decided you weren't worth the tip.
Jack exhaled slowly and pocketed his phone. No money for a cab. Not that he would've spent it on that. Not when he could still walk. That was the one thing Arthur hadn't taken from him yet — the goddamn ability to put one foot in front of the other.
Outside, Eldenport smelled like it always did — sea rot, spilled fryer oil, and the metal stink of too many wires heating up under broken concrete. A breeze came off the harbor thick with diesel. Streetlights flickered on early, sickly orange, and a billboard flashed above the skyline advertising luxury condos built by Rourke-Thorne Development, Arthur's favorite vanity project. The irony wasn't lost on Jack.
He walked north, through graffiti-scarred underpasses and past shuttered pawnshops. The wind cut through his threadbare coat. Each step toward Arthur's building felt heavier than the last.
The city changed block by block, like flipping channels. Shuttered storefronts gave way to gleaming cafes with glass walls and people who didn't seem to understand what it meant to look down while walking. Jack tried to ignore the sideways glances. He didn't belong here. He never had.
At 6:58 p.m., he stood in front of The Sentinel — Arthur's glass-and-steel ego monument, thirty-nine stories high with a private elevator that didn't open for just anyone.
The doorman eyed Jack's faded coat and scuffed boots, but when Jack muttered, "Rourke. He's expecting me," the man tapped something on a hidden panel and stepped aside without a word.
Inside the elevator, Jack checked his reflection. Hollow eyes. Weeks of beard. A jaw that used to look sharp, now just tired. He ran a hand through his hair and felt grit under his nails.
Ding.
Penthouse.
The doors slid open with a hiss, revealing polished floors and quiet that felt sterile. A vase of white orchids stood sentinel by the entry, too perfect to be real. Jack stepped out and let the elevator shut behind him.
Arthur was waiting by the bar, pouring himself something amber into a crystal glass. He didn't look up.
Jack stood in the doorway a second too long.
Then:
"Well. You came."
PART 2: The Penthouse and the Fight
"Well. You came."
Arthur's voice was smooth as always — cultured, effortless, like the pour of the scotch he was tilting into a glass. He didn't bother turning around. He didn't need to. He'd always assumed Jack would come crawling back eventually.
Jack stepped in, his boots making dull thuds against the polished slate floor. The place looked like a hotel lobby crossed with a showroom — everything sleek, muted, expensive. A fireplace flickered beneath a wall-mounted screen showing muted financial news. Behind Arthur, the city sparkled through floor-to-ceiling glass like it had something to prove.
Jack's voice came out dry. "You redecorate, or just throw more money at the same dead silence?"
Arthur turned now. Casual — golf slacks, designer pullover, Rolex catching the light. His smile was thin and sharp.
"I see you're still auditioning for the role of bitter failure."
Jack swallowed a reply. He wasn't here to spar. Not yet.
"You said seven. I'm here. What the hell do you want?"
Arthur took a sip, walked to the kitchen island, and placed a small leather folder on the marble surface.
"You owe money, Jack. More than you can possibly pay. Again."
"Thanks for the math lesson. You dragged me here to shame me in person?"
Arthur chuckled. "You always default to wounded pride. I'm offering you a solution."
Jack approached the folder. He didn't open it.
"What is it?"
"A legal waiver. You sign it, and I make the debts disappear. Wipe the slate clean. No more phone calls from bookmakers. No more leaning on your ex-wife for scraps. You walk away clean."
Jack stared at the folder. Something about the way Arthur said "clean" made his skin itch.
"And what's the catch?" he asked.
Arthur turned back toward the window, sipping his drink.
"You give up any claim to Dad's estate. Retroactively and in perpetuity. Not that there's much left. Just enough to matter in probate. And you stop contacting Leah. Permanently. She doesn't need you confusing her."
The air shifted.
Jack didn't move.
"You son of a bitch," he said, softly.
Arthur glanced over his shoulder. "It's generous, Jack. You should be grateful."
Jack took a slow step forward, eyes fixed on his brother.
"You think you can buy me out of her life? Just erase me like a bad investment?"
Arthur turned fully, expression bored. "You already did that yourself."
Jack slammed both palms down on the counter, making the glass tremble.
"She's my daughter."
"She's a teenager with a future. She doesn't need a degenerate addict dragging her down out of guilt."
Jack reached for the folder — and flung it across the room. Papers scattered like broken feathers.
Arthur didn't flinch. "Predictable," he said. "Always the flailing dramatics when you don't get your way."
"You have no idea what it's like, Arthur. None."
Arthur's voice dropped an octave. "What it's like to clean up your messes for the last decade? I know exactly what it's like. I'm done. This was your lifeline, and you spat on it."
Jack stared at him, jaw twitching.
Then Arthur turned, casually flicking the remaining scotch in his glass toward the sink — and instead, with a sharp motion, hurled the crystal tumbler across the room. It shattered against the far wall, shards skittering across the floor.
The silence that followed was absolute.
Jack took one breath, then another, and turned without a word. He walked back to the elevator. Behind him, Arthur didn't call out.
The doors opened. Jack stepped in. The last thing he saw was his brother's reflection in the glass, watching like a man certain he'd won something.
PART 3: Downfall
The elevator hissed shut behind him, and Jack didn't breathe until it was moving.
As the numbers ticked downward, he pressed his forehead to the mirrored panel, the cool surface grounding him in a way nothing else had all day. His fists were still clenched. His jaw still tight. He hadn't hit Arthur, but God, he'd wanted to. That smirk. That calm. That cold-blooded precision that always came out when Arthur wanted control — like a man measuring how much rope it would take to hang you and sell the leftover silk.
He stumbled out into the lobby and didn't look at the doorman. Back on the street, he walked south without direction, just the instinct to escape — from the building, from the offer, from the version of himself that had stood there like a stray dog with rain in its eyes.
Twenty minutes later, he was on Grayson Avenue, in front of Kelly's Den — a low-slung box of fake wood and neon that had once banned him but stopped caring after the third change of ownership.
Inside, the air was a dense soup of cigarettes, cheap beer, and whatever air freshener had been halfheartedly sprayed last week.
He ordered a drink without making eye contact. The bartender — a woman in her forties with a tattoo sleeve and no patience — poured him a double and didn't ask for payment. Jack didn't know if that meant she pitied him or just knew he'd be gone before anyone cared.
The first sip burned in a way that didn't comfort.
He sat. He drank. Then he started talking.
To nobody in particular. Then to everybody.
Something about brothers. Something about money. Something about a daughter he couldn't see. The words slurred and stretched, clumsy and sour, spilling out like oil from a cracked engine.
At some point someone laughed. At some point someone told him to shut up.
Jack rose, unsteady.
"You don't know," he muttered, finger wagging at no one. "You don't know what it's like to be erased. To be the bad chapter everyone skips."
The bartender snapped, "You need to go, Jack."
He blinked. "Do I know you?"
"You threw up in the jukebox last year. Out."
He was nudged toward the door. He didn't resist
The night air hit like a slap. He shuffled toward the alley behind the bar, fumbling with his zipper. He found a dumpster and relieved himself beside it, mumbling curses.
Then the nausea came. He leaned against the wall, dry heaved, and slid down until he was sitting in what might've been grease or something worse. The city blurred above him, a pinwheel of red taillights and window lights and stars that probably weren't even stars, just reflections.
He blacked out.
The next thing he heard was the crunch of shoes on gravel.
Two figures stood over him. One knelt down.
"Jack Rourke?"
He opened one eye. "Is this about the jukebox?"
Hands yanked him up. The world tilted. He was slammed against the wall.
"Jack Rourke, you're under arrest for the murder of Arthur Rourke."
The words hit harder than the shove.
"What?"
The second figure cuffed him roughly.
"You have the right to remain silent—"
Jack twisted, stunned. "Arthur's what? He's not—he's—no—"
"—anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law—"
"I didn't—! I didn't—!"
His words scattered like the folder he'd thrown across Arthur's penthouse. He couldn't catch any of them.
PART 4: The Interrogation
Fluorescent light hummed overhead, relentless.
The interrogation room at Precinct 12 smelled like old coffee and older furniture. Jack sat slumped in a metal chair, wrists chained to the ring bolted into the table. His coat had been taken. His socks were damp. His head throbbed.
Across from him, Sergeant Ethan Kerr — pressed suit, clean shave, and the kind of smile you'd see in a campaign ad — flipped through a manila folder like he already knew the ending.
"You look like hell, Rourke."
Jack didn't respond. His mouth was dry, tongue thick. His thoughts moved like syrup.
Kerr slid a glossy photo across the table. A penthouse crime scene, wide shot. Clean white rug. Too clean. Sofa. Whiskey decanter. Body not shown — but the blood wasn't hidden.
Jack stared.
"Arthur Rourke. Pronounced dead at 11:32 p.m. last night. Blunt force trauma to the skull. No signs of forced entry. No security alarms. No defensive wounds. Just one good hit."
Jack's throat worked. "You think I did that."
Kerr leaned back. "You were seen entering the building at 6:57 p.m. and leaving at 7:36, according to the lobby camera. You had motive — he was cutting you off. Witness in 39B reported raised voices. You were picked up passed out in an alley five blocks away, reeking of alcohol, at 12:12 a.m."
"I was drunk, not a killer."
Kerr slid another photo. A close-up of a silver letter opener with an ornate brass hilt, lying on a kitchen counter beside an open drawer.
"Your prints. No gloves. The drawer's contents undisturbed. It wasn't stored there."
Jack blinked. "I didn't touch that. I touched... I don't know. A glass, maybe. A folder."
"You don't remember, or you won't say?"
"I didn't kill him."
Kerr reached into the folder again. Pulled out a third photo: a cufflink. Oval, gold, antique. Engraved with a tiny "R."
"Arthur always wore these. Family heirloom. Custom-made pair. One was found still on his wrist. The other... gone."
Jack stared. "You think I took it?"
"You were desperate for cash. Maybe you pocketed it without thinking. Maybe you planned to pawn it. Maybe you left it somewhere by accident."
Jack shook his head slowly.
"Why would I kill the only person dumb enough to still give me money?"
Kerr offered a small, practiced laugh.
"Isn't that the story of your life?"
Jack flinched.
The silence stretched.
Kerr folded his hands.
"Just make this easier. Tell me what happened."
Jack leaned forward, eyes glassy.
"You want the truth? I went up there. We argued. He tried to buy me off. I told him to go to hell. I left. I went to a bar, got drunk, passed out in a gutter. That's it."
Kerr raised an eyebrow.
"And what time did you leave the bar?"
"I don't know. Late."
"You're telling me — with a clean record of prints, motive, timing, and no alibi — you expect me to believe you just wandered off into the night?"
Jack looked down. His wrists twitched against the cuffs.
"I don't care what you believe."
Kerr nodded, pushed back from the table, and stood.
"Well. I'll give you some time to think. But the DA won't. Your arraignment's in the morning."
As he left, the door clicked shut with finality.
Jack exhaled, long and low.
He was alone. Again.
PART 5: A Doubtful Eye
Through the one-way glass, Detective Inspector Isabella Diaz stood with her arms crossed, her blazer unbuttoned, a steaming paper cup balanced in one hand. The observation room was dim, lit only by the flicker of the monitor replaying the last ten minutes.
She had watched Jack Rourke slump in that chair like a man made of wet rope. Watched Kerr circle him like a shark with a badge. Watched the folder drop, the photos slide, the cuffs clink.
She'd seen this show before — same angles, same hungry confidence in Kerr's voice. The rhythm of an open-and-shut win.
But Izzy wasn't watching what Kerr said.
She was watching Jack.
She sipped her coffee, lips twitching as she rewound the footage.
Click. Frame-by-frame.
There.
The exact second Kerr said: "Arthur Rourke. Pronounced dead at 11:32 p.m."
Jack didn't react. Just blinked.
But then — "Blunt force trauma to the skull."
That's when he flinched. Not big. Not dramatic. A twitch behind the eyes. A subtle breath pulled short.
Someone who'd seen that kind of death would've flinched at the mention of when or who. Someone innocent — truly innocent — flinched when they heard the how.
Izzy rewound again. Rewatched it. Three times.
She let the scene play on — Jack's refusal to admit guilt, his dazed confusion. There was desperation there, yes, but it wasn't the sweaty scrambling of a man trying to lie his way out of a noose.
It was the kind of desperation that came when you were already on the gallows and couldn't figure out why no one believed you hadn't tied the rope.
Behind her, the door creaked open. A young officer leaned in.
"You sitting in on this one, Diaz?"
Izzy didn't answer right away. Her eyes lingered on the screen as Jack slumped forward under the overhead glare.
She finally turned, her voice even.
"Send me the full case file."
The officer blinked. "Thought this was Kerr's?"
"It still is. I just want to see what's already been missed."
She set the coffee down. The cup was still nearly full.