Chapter 182 The Blonde Blackwood Roman I watched my brother’s face shift. Surprise first. Then confusion. Then shock. Then, finally—realization. A slow, dawning awareness creeping across his features like rot spreading under the skin. “You’ve been deceived,” Reese said with a rough, humorless chuckle. Like the situation was so absurd, so twisted that he couldn't help but laugh. “Let me guess—you’re the one feeding these nasty stories to Savannah? You really are dumber than I thought. You let an old cunning man deceive you with what? Doctored texts? A burner phone? Are you that gullible, or were you just desperate to shift the blame to someone else?” “You can spin whatever narrative you want, Reese,” I hissed. My jaw clenched so hard it hurt. “But that doesn’t change the fact that I know what I saw in that cellphone. I know the messages I read. You’re not talking your way out of this one.” “Oh really?” he asked, leaning back against the counter, smug. Like he was the only sane one in the room. “If you really believe those texts—then tell me… what was my contact name saved as on Dahlia’s phone?” I frowned. The question sounded so insignificant compared to the war happening between us. “What the hell are you talking about? It was saved as Reese. What else would she save it as? ‘Love of my fucking life’?” “No.” He dipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out his phone. His fingers moved confidently, like he had known this moment was coming. He didn’t even look at me as he navigated. Then he shoved the phone into my face. “Look,” he said. The screen showed a message thread—Dahlia and Reese. But this… this wasn’t the thread I had seen years ago. This wasn’t the poison that had destroyed everything. My pulse hammered as my eyes scanned the messages. ~~~~~ Dahlia: Guess what I saved your contact as? Reese: Reese the Menace? You’ve called me that a million times. Got it, right? Dahlia: LOL. No. I figured you'd guess that easily. So I found another one. “The Blonde Blackwood.” A screenshot followed as proof. Dahlia: Cool, isn’t it?Reese: Badass more like. But… I like it. Good job, Dee. Still waiting for that portrait. Dahlia: Almost done! It’ll be yours soon. Fingers crossed he likes it. Hahaha. Then the final message she sent Reese was what speared through my ribs and cracked something open: Dahlia: I love him. I don’t want to leave him. But I know I have to, if not I'll die. Why’s the world so cruel, Reese? ~~~~~ My throat closed. My heartbeat stopped. My lungs forgot what to do. The room felt like it was tilting, like gravity itself had pulled away from me. That wasn’t the chat I saw. That wasn’t the Dahlia I was shown. That wasn’t Reese betraying me. That was Dahlia confiding in him. Crying to him. Loving me. My wife loved me. My brother was loyal to me. Someone broke that on purpose. Reese slipped the phone back into his pocket like he hadn’t just shattered the foundation of my life. Like he hadn’t just taken everything I thought I knew and ground it into dust under his heel.“Still not convinced?” he asked, voice flat. “You still think I had something to do with Dahlia? What else do I need to show you? Huh? Tell me, Roman. Tell me what will make you finally see the truth.” My mind was spinning. Faces blurred. The world blurred. Everything I believed in—every rage, every resentment, every day I spent hating my own brother—it all began to look grotesque. “What did you people do to her?” My voice came out raw, broken, unsteady. “Why were her texts doctored? Why was her phone tampered with? What did you and Reginald do to Dahlia?” Reese’s face twisted—hurt, disgusted, offended all at once. “What the fuck do you mean me? I did nothing but be kind to her. I defended her. I listened to her when you were gone.” His voice dropped. “If you want to know what happened to Dahlia—ask The General.” My breaths came uneven. My palms were sweating. My heart was breaking in ways I didn't know hearts could break. Everything was a lie. Everything had been a lie. Nothing happened between Reese and Dahlia. I grabbed him by the collar. I didn’t even remember deciding to move. One moment my hands were empty, the next they were twisted in the fabric of his shirt, pulling him close enough for me to feel the heat of his breath. The rage that lived in me was choking me. “What do you know?” I growled. “Tell me! Tell me who Naomi’s father is. Who is the bastard?!” He laughed—not because it was funny. But because he was unraveling. “You want answers now? Now you want the truth, Roman? After years of refusing to see it? After choosing to believe him over me every single time?” He shook his head. “You should’ve listened. But since you want to threaten me now—fine. Threaten. Do it. I’m not giving you shit.” “I swear to God,” I whispered, voice trembling with something animal, “if you don’t tell me, you are no longer my brother. I will erase you, Reese. You will not exist to me. My children will not know your name. I will not remember you.” My grip tightened. “I will choose forgetting you over forgiving you.” That broke something in him. Reese looked at me like I'd reached deep inside him and pulled his heart out. His voice lowered. His eyes were glassy. But he didn’t fight me. Even though he had every right to. “I don’t know who the father is,” he said quietly. “I just know… father used to… make Dahlia entertain his guests when you were away.” Something inside me snapped so violently I felt it physically. “What?” My voice came out empty. Like the word had no air behind it. Reese swallowed hard. “He allowed them to do anything to her if they wanted to.” Time did not slow. It stopped. The world muted into a dull ringing. My vision blurred at the edges. My body felt like it was made of smoke. I pulled him closer because if I let go I would fall. “Who?” My voice was no longer a voice. It was a wound. “Who touched her? Who had the fucking balls to touch my wife?! Tell me their names and I swear I'll make them bleed.” He looked at me—broken for me, broken for her, broken for himself. “She didn’t know their real names. She only called them by what they were to him.” His eyes didn’t leave mine. “The Lawman. The Medicine Man. The Party Man. The General…” He paused. And his next words hollowed me. “And The Professor.” Silence. The only thing I could hear was ringing. Nothing else. No breath. No thought. No sound. Just that name. The same man I thought I killed for touching what was mine. The man I thought I buried to erase the violation. The ghost who laughed at me from the grave because he had done worse—twice. I didn’t feel rage. I didn’t feel grief. I felt something new. Something cold. Something patient. Something that would not rest until the world bled. Everything was white noise. The only thing running round my mind was the last name he'd mentioned. The same one I'd wondered what the connection was to my father. The same one I believed I'd wiped off the surface of the earth for once touching what was mine. The Professor. And now—I knew I had a much bigger problem. How the hell was I supposed to kill a dead man?