The Return of the Almighty Dragon Jackal

Chapter 4: Signed and Sealed

The air inside the Rogers estate was suffocating long before the lawyer opened his briefcase. Andrew could feel the walls pressing in on him, painted with the sneers of ancestors who seemed to watch silently from their portraits, waiting to see how far he would fall. His father had been gone barely a week, yet the house had already shifted its loyalty. The corridors whispered with strange footsteps, the staff looked through him instead of at him, and everywhere he turned, Carina's shadow loomed, silk-wrapped and poisonous. Olivia trailed after her like a smirking echo, chewing gum while wearing black lace as though the funeral had been a stage play rather than a farewell.

When Andrew stepped into the drawing room, his chest felt carved open. The mahogany table stretched like a gallows between him and them. Carina sat at the head, spine straight, lips blood red, every inch the grieving widow for an audience that wasn’t here. Olivia lounged at her side, flicking her hair back with deliberate insolence, her gum snapping loud in the silence. Across from them the lawyer adjusted his glasses, a thin man whose darting eyes told Andrew he was less a man of justice and more a man who had already chosen whom to serve.

“Per the instructions left behind by the deceased, Roger Blackwood,” the lawyer began, his voice rehearsed and empty, “I will now read the contents of his last will and testament.”

Andrew leaned forward. His heart hammered, hope warring with dread. His father had promised change, had whispered plans for a future where Andrew and Richard would stand beside him again. He could still hear that promise. He clung to it as the lawyer unfolded the paper.

“To my beloved wife, Carina, and my cherished daughter, Olivia, I bequeath all holdings under my name—the estate, the company shares, personal assets, and properties domestic and abroad.”

Andrew’s breath caught. The words blurred before his eyes. Then came the knife.

“As for my estranged son, Andrew, I leave my deepest regrets and a hope that he may someday find peace.”

The room froze. A single rumble of thunder shook the windowpanes. Carina’s smile curled with quiet triumph. Olivia burst into laughter that she didn’t bother to hide, her cruel amusement filling every corner like perfume that choked rather than sweetened.

Andrew rose, his chair scraping the floor. “That’s not possible. My father would never—”

“The will is legitimate,” the lawyer snapped, his voice sharp now, as though Andrew’s grief were an inconvenience. “Signed and sealed with witness.”

Andrew’s voice cracked with a force he couldn’t hold back. “No. My father wanted me back in the company. He spoke of Richard’s future. He said we would be together again. He—he would never throw me away for you.” His eyes locked on Carina.

She rose slowly, gliding closer until her perfume clouded around him. “Maybe he realized you were nothing but trouble, Andrew. Maybe he saw you for what you are—an embarrassment.”

“You’re lying,” Andrew whispered, his chest tightening, heat prickling behind his eyes though he refused to let tears fall. “This is a lie.”

Carina leaned close, her lips almost brushing his ear. “And who will believe you? The boy who vanished for fifteen years, or the woman who never left his side?” Her words slid like ice into his veins. When she pulled back, her eyes glittered with a venom that belonged to predators savoring a kill.

Olivia clapped her hands, laughing louder. “Encore! You’ve got talent, Andrew. That wounded look—you could win an award for it.”

His fists clenched so tight the bones ached. Every part of him screamed to strike, to shatter the glass calm of their mockery, yet he held himself rigid, burning from the inside out. His father’s voice, the one that used to guide him, was silent now, twisted by Carina’s hand into a dagger and buried deep in his chest.

The lawyer packed his briefcase quickly, offering condolences that sounded more like dismissal. Carina sat back down and poured herself wine as if she had just hosted a victory toast. Olivia chattered about what room she would renovate first, her tone light, careless, already stripping the house of its history. Andrew stumbled from the room, the taste of betrayal bitter on his tongue, the storm outside spilling drizzle onto his skin as he collapsed on the stone steps. He pressed his palms into his eyes, forcing back the scream clawing at his throat.

“Are you watching this, Father?” he whispered into the sky. “They are all overturning your plans, claiming your wealth for themselves.” A spark of certainty glowed in his eyes. “I know you would never leave me like this. You told me you were preparing something for me and Richard. This is surely Lady Carina's scheme. And I promise to uncover it.”

That very night the estate shifted from unwelcoming to hostile. Old staff disappeared overnight. New faces replaced them—loyal only to Carina, silent, eyes cold. The cook was gone, the gardener vanished, even the guards rotated without explanation. Andrew felt the house watching him, every corner a threat, every shadow suspect. Carina drifted through the halls like a queen who had conquered her enemy, her smiles sharp, her words dripping with sugar that poisoned everything it touched. Olivia smashed plates in tantrums, mocked Richard’s condition openly, and sneered at Andrew with demands that he take his place in the servants’ quarters. The venom in her tone stung deeper because she enjoyed every moment of it.

Andrew ignored them. He refused to bend. He bathed Richard, fed him, whispered stories of their childhood in the quiet hours of the night. He told his brother about the mountain, about the monk, about their father’s promises. Sometimes, just sometimes, he swore Richard’s fingers twitched when he spoke.

But the venom only thickened. One evening he entered Richard’s room and froze. The IV bag was no longer filled with the herbal solution he had prepared but with a filthy water that shimmered under the light in a way that made his skin crawl. Rage consumed him. He grabbed the nurse by the wrist hard enough to make her cry out, demanding answers. She stammered ignorance. Carina glided into the room moments later, wide-eyed innocence painted across her face. Olivia leaned against the wall, arms folded, a smirk tugging her lips.

“I know nothing of this,” Carina said, her voice smooth, practiced. “Perhaps you made a mistake or… perhaps your brother changed it himself.”

A loud laughter bursted from Olivia. “Mom! How can he do that with his stiff body.” Her voice, laced with mockery.

“You tampered with it,” Andrew spat, facing Olivia. “Don’t you dare deny it.”

Olivia laughed. “Paranoid this much? Seems like you’re losing your mind.”

The staff said nothing. Silent witnesses who feared or served the wrong master. Andrew replaced the IV himself, his hands trembling with fury. That night he placed a blade beneath his pillow and locked the doors. He slept in shifts, half his body awake while the other pretended to rest. In the darkness, he whispered to Richard, voice low and desperate. “Hold on. I’ll get us out of this. Just hold on.”

Days dragged like chains through the poisoned halls. Then came the envelope. Slipped beneath his door without sound. No name, no seal, only a single photograph inside. Roger’s car, parked days before the crash outside an abandoned warehouse at the city’s edge. Scrawled in red ink beneath it: Accidents don’t make appointments.

Andrew’s blood ran cold. His hands shook as he stared at the image, his heart pounding so violently it made his ribs ache. The crash hadn’t been an accident. Someone had killed his father. And the message was clear—they weren’t finished.

He hid the photograph in his jacket, every instinct screaming that the walls around him had ears. He forced himself to move like normal, though nothing felt normal anymore. Each step echoed like a countdown.

The days blurred after that, each one heavier than the last. He visited Richard at St. Monique’s, sitting for hours by his brother’s side, his voice raw from one-sided conversations. It was there, among the sterile corridors and the hum of machines, that he met Charlotte Rivers. She appeared like a breath of clean air in a suffocating room, her movements graceful. She was new to the hospital, but when she walked the halls it felt as though they bent around her presence. Her eyes stopped him—not for beauty alone, but because they carried no pity, no judgment, only a piercing calm that saw him for who he was.

Their first exchange was clumsy. He had spilled coffee outside Richard’s room, hands unsteady after yet another hollow update from the doctor. She crouched before he could react, dabbing the spill with a napkin, looking up at him with quiet steadiness. “You okay?” she asked, her voice soft yet carrying a weight that made his throat tighten. He forced a strained smile. “Just tired.”

She noticed the badge with Richard’s name and gave a small nod. “Room 312. You’re here a lot.”

“Every day,” he admitted. She didn’t reply with empty sympathy. She looked straight at him and said, “That kind of loyalty is rare.”

Those words rooted inside him. From that moment their paths kept crossing—morning greetings turned into conversations, conversations stretched into walks through the hospital garden, silence became shared rather than lonely. When he struggled to breathe beneath the weight of grief, she led him to the rooftop and let him shout into the night air. She didn’t try to fix him, didn’t smother him with comfort, she simply stood by him, steady, unshaken.

One night she entered Richard’s room and found Andrew asleep, his head resting against his brother’s hand. She didn’t wake him. She draped a blanket over his shoulders, dimmed the lights, and left quietly. When he discovered it later, his chest ached with something he hadn’t felt in years. He asked her why. She shrugged gently. “Because someone should take care of you too.”

They began to meet outside the hospital. Coffee from chipped mugs, wandering through secondhand bookstores, a quiet picnic beneath a sky heavy with the threat of rain. She learned about his mother, about Richard, about his buried passion for painting. He never told her about Carina or the poisoned house. Speaking it aloud would make it too real, and she was the only part of his life untouched by corruption. She was the fragile corner of light he couldn’t risk staining.

One evening, with the sun spilling gold across her face, she looked at him for a long time before saying, “Whatever happens, don’t let the world turn your heart to stone.”

He met her gaze, his voice low, thick with all he couldn’t say. “You’re the only reason it hasn’t, Cynthia. With you by my side, I will definitely regain everything I've lost, one after the other.”