LOTTERY OF VENGEANCE

Chapter Two – Ashes of Yesterday

The rain came three days too late. By then, the blood had already dried. Jackson Carter limped down the same alley he once called a shortcut home, his body stitched together with scars, his soul shredded beyond repair.

Each step was a battle; each breath tasted of iron. His ribs screamed with every movement, his vision still blurred where fists had broken bone. But none of that pain compared to the hollow silence inside him.

The Carter home was gone. The police came, wrote their reports, zipped up his mother and sister in black bags, and drove away. No justice. No investigation.

Just two more names tossed into the forgotten pile of bodies that didn’t matter. The house itself was boarded, marked unsafe, left to rot like the memories it contained. Jackson had nothing left.

For weeks, he roamed the streets, a ghost with bloodshot eyes and torn clothes. People stepped around him like he was a stain on the sidewalk.

He dug through trash bins for scraps, stole water when no one was looking, and slept wherever the rain didn’t reach.

Sometimes, he saw her, Anna running ahead of him, laughter trailing in the wind. Sometimes, he felt his mother’s hand on his cheek, whispering strength into his ears. But when he reached for them, he always found empty air.

It was in those nights he wished the men had killed him too, The city moved on without him. Neon signs lit up Westbridge nights, music poured out of bars, and the mafia’s grip grew tighter on the streets.

Jackson knew their faces, he had memorized them as his mother gasped her final words. But what could he do? A broken twenty-year-old kid with no money, no weapons, and no power?

His fists shook with rage whenever he thought of them, but rage couldn’t fill an empty stomach. Rage couldn’t bring the dead back. He became a shadow, silent, invisible, forgotten. Until fate decided otherwise.

It was a cold evening when he found it. Jackson was crouched near a dumpster behind a gas station, hands numb from digging through soggy wrappers. The clerk had thrown out half-eaten sandwiches, and he’d learned to time it just right. Hunger was louder than shame.

As he reached for a torn paper bag, something fluttered out, carried by the wind. At first, he ignored it, probably trash, like everything else. But then it slapped against his leg and stuck there, wet and crumpled. A lottery ticket.

Jackson frowned, peeling it off. No, two tickets, still intact despite the rain. Both marked, both stamped from the convenience store just two blocks away. He almost laughed. “Figures. Even trash mocks me now.”

But then his eyes caught the numbers. And the date. It was from last week’s draw. The jackpot had been announced all over the city. Six hundred million dollars. He remembered overhearing drunks shouting about it in the bar across the street. Jackson froze.

He pulled the second ticket closer, his hands trembling, his breath shallow. His eyes scanned the sequence again and again, afraid they would change. But they didn’t. It was the winning ticket. Both were. Six. Hundred. Million.

For a long moment, Jackson sat in the alley, staring at the paper like it was a ghost. His chest rose and fell in rapid bursts, his brain screaming at him that this couldn’t be real. He shook it, pressed it to his forehead, even tore a corner just to see if it bled. But it was real.

The world blurred around him as laughter bubbled from his throat, sharp, broken, almost hysterical. He stumbled back against the dumpster, clutching the tickets like lifelines.

Six hundred million. Enough to change everything. Enough to bury his pain in gold. Enough to, His mother’s words echoed again: Look at their faces. Do not spare anyone of them. Jackson’s laughter died. His grip tightened.

This wasn’t luck. It wasn’t chance. It was fate handing him a weapon sharper than any blade, louder than any gun. Money was power. And power was exactly what he needed.

The next morning, Jackson stood in line at the state lottery office, his clothes filthy, his hair matted, his body stinking of the streets.

The people around him sneered, whispering about the homeless junkie who didn’t belong. But Jackson didn’t hear them. He clutched the tickets to his chest like a prayer.

When his number was called, he staggered to the counter. The clerk’s expression shifted from disdain to shock as she scanned the slips.

She called for the manager, who called for security, who called for verification. Papers shuffled, phones rang, signatures scribbled across forms. And then, a handshake.

“Congratulations, Mr. Carter,” the manager said, his voice trembling. “You’re the sole winner of six hundred million dollars.”

Flashbulbs burst in Jackson’s imagination. He didn’t smile. He didn’t thank anyone. He only nodded once and muttered, “Cash it out. Quietly.”

By nightfall, his life had changed. Accounts were opened under false names, funds split across borders, investments hidden behind shell corporations.

He disappeared into hotels no one tracked, wore clothes no one recognized, and studied men no one dared cross. The broken boy on Redwood Street was dead. Something else was taking his place.

Days bled into nights, weeks into months. Jackson trained his body until the bruises hardened into muscle. He sharpened his mind with books on finance, politics, psychology, strategy.

He learned to fight, to lie, to disappear. He was no longer the starving kid clutching scraps in an alley, he was a ghost cloaked in billions. And through it all, one fire burned inside him. Revenge.

On a rain-soaked evening, Jackson stood before a mirror in a penthouse overlooking the city. The glass reflected not the broken youth, but a man reborn, sharp suit, cold eyes, jaw set like steel. He adjusted his tie with steady fingers.

On the dresser lay a photograph, edges torn, corners stained with blood. His family. His mother’s smile. His sister’s innocence. And beside it, a newspaper clipping. “Victor Moretti, Business Tycoon, Expands Westbridge Holdings.”

Jackson’s lips curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. Victor Moretti. The man his mother had cursed with her final breath. The man who had stolen his father, his mother, his sister, his world.

Jackson slipped the clipping into his jacket pocket, took one last look at his reflection, and whispered: “It’s time.”

Jackson, armed with unimaginable wealth and a hidden identity, steps into the world of his enemies—ready to begin a war they will never see coming.