The door swung open just enough for Johnathan to see what no husband should ever witness. Marie….his Marie arched beneath another man. Her voice, the soft gasp he once believed belonged only to him, poured into the room like poison. And the man above her, moving with shameless confidence, wasn't a stranger.
It was Lex Mark.
Jonathan's boss. His mentor. His friend.
His murderer in the making.
For a moment, Johnathan didn't breathe. The flowers slipped from his hand, petals collapsing under his shoes. The shock muted the world, drowning every sound in a rising roar inside his skull. Then Marie's gaze snapped to the door.
She froze.
Her face drained of color, eyes wide with horror. Filled with the fear of consequences.
Lex turned his head lazily toward the door, as if this were planned, as if Johnathan walking in on them was some twisted business meeting. His smirk was slow, precise like he'd been waiting.
"Well," Lex said, voice thick with satisfaction, "early today, Collin ?"
Johnathan staggered forward, every step fueled by disbelief. "Marie?" His voice cracked. "You're—" Words shattered in his throat. He wasn't angry yet. Just broken.
Marie pulled the bedsheet up to cover herself, shaking. "Jack….listen—we never meant…."
"To hurt you?" Johnathan cut in, voice hollow. "You're in bed with my boss."
Lex chuckled, shameless. "Don't act like a hero, Jonathan. You never gave her the life she deserves."
Marie swallowed hard, eyes darting between them. She didn't deny it. She didn't apologize. She didn't even look ashamed. She just clutched the sheet tighter and whispered, "You're… just too small for me. For us. I can't live struggling forever."
Us.
A single word that sliced deeper than betrayal. There had been an us long before Johnathan found out.
Johnathan felt something inside him fracture, something older, something heavy and instinctive. His chest pulsed, heat rippling beneath his ribs. His vision sharpened as though a new sense were waking inside him.
He stepped closer. "How long?"
Marie flinched from him as though he were the intruder. "A year," she whispered.
Lex shrugged proudly. "Since the first time you stayed overnight at work to save the company. Your loyalty is cute, Collin . But loyalty doesn't make you powerful. It makes you predictable."
Jonathan's hands trembled. Not with fear. With something hotter.
"You ruined your marriage," Johnathan said quietly. "To save a company that never cared about you."
Lex laughed, swinging his legs off the bed and standing as though nothing were wrong. "That's the difference between us. You think love and loyalty are investments. But the world runs on power."
Johnathan backed toward the door. "I'm calling the police."
Marie gasped. Lex's smirk snapped into a snarl. "You should know your place, Collin ."
He lunged.
Johnathan barely raised his hands before Lex grabbed him by the collar, dragging him forward and slamming him into the dresser. Wood shattered. Jonathan's skull cracked against the edge. A sharp, sickening pain exploded through the back of his head. His vision blurred, the room spinning, doubling, fading.
Marie screamed. "Lex, stop! We just need to talk"
Johnathan stumbled, blood trailing down his temple, warm and sticky. He clawed toward the door, but his vision swam. Lex grabbed him again, shoving him against the dresser a second time. The crack of impact echoed like thunder.
He hit the floor.
A ringing sound filled his ears. Pain pulsed, heavy and drowning. His limbs refused to move.
Marie crouched beside him, panic in her eyes but not for him. "We can't let him call the police!" she cried, voice sharp and desperate.
Johnathan blinked slowly. His heart pounded erratically, the strange heat from earlier now blazing through his chest like molten metal. He reached up, fingers trembling, as though trying to tear something out of himself.
Marie backed away from his touch, terrified of what he might do and what might happen to her life if he lived.
Lex loomed over him. "You were supposed to stay quiet, Collin . Nobody likes it when the dog barks back."
Johnathan opened his mouth, tasting blood. He didn't beg. He didn't plead. He just looked at the woman he loved—really looked.
Marie covered her ears. She couldn't bear his gaze.
Lex wrapped his fingers around Jonathan's throat.
Johnathan tried to push him away, but his arms moved like they were underwater. He struggled, gasping for air, nails digging into Lex's arm with what little strength he had left.
Lex tightened his grip.
Marie held Jonathan's shoulders down.
He could hear them saying something. Marie's tears, Lex's curses but everything blurred into a distant echo as his lungs burned.
The heat in his chest surged, cracking, expanding, screaming to break free.
Stop… stop… Johnathan thought desperately, not at Lex, but to the thing inside him. Help me…
His heart answered with a burst of blinding pain.
Marie shrieked. "What's happening to him?!"
Lex swore. "Just finish it!"
Jonathan's vision trembled, filled with shattered light. His pulse roared like thunder. The heat turned into fire. Not enough to save him, but enough to mark his death.
A burning spread outward from the center of his chest, it was pain so intense it silenced every thought. His veins felt like they were igniting.
Marie screamed again. "Do it!"
Lex twisted harder.
Johnathan gasped one final breath that tasted like smoke.
Then everything went still.
*************
They stared at his lifeless body, faces pale with fear, realizing too late they'd killed something they didn't understand.
Lex's voice shook. "Help me get him into the car."
Marie sobbed, but she helped him. They dragged Jonathan's limp form, stuffed it into Lex's trunk, and sped toward the ocean cliffs, the same cliff Johnathan had walked beside only an hour earlier.
The wind howled as they opened the trunk. They didn't say a prayer. They didn't apologize. They rolled his body into the raging sea and let the waves swallow him whole.
Jonathan's last sensation was cold water flooding his lungs as the darkness closed in.
But beneath his skin, the dormant heirloom finally awakened—
and as he sank, the Destral Core pulsed with light,
glowing like a star beneath the water.