CASSIAN
The rhythmic crack of the shotgun echoed across Mateo's sprawling estate, a sharp, violent sound that should have been cathartic. Another clay pigeon disintegrated into a cloud of orange dust against the bruising purple of the Spanish twilight.
I didn't feel the thrill of the hit. I didn't feel the satisfaction of the perfect lead or the steady kick of the stock against my shoulder. I felt nothing. Just a cold, dense numbness that had been settling into my marrow since I walked out of that conference room.
Skeet shooting is what men like us do when we want to destroy things without the inconvenience of a cleanup. It's clinical destruction. But as the afternoon bled into evening, even the mechanical slaughter of ceramic discs wasn't enough to drown out the noise in my head.
