Chapter 1
Chapter 1 I was being tortured, but my dad, the hotshot detective, and my mom, the top medical examiner, were at my little brother Ethan’s tennis tournament. The guy doing this to me, someone my dad had put away, wanted revenge. He cut out my tongue, then called my dad from my phone. My dad just said, “Whatever it is, Ethan’s match is more important right now!” and hung up. The guy laughed. “Guess I kidnapped the wrong kid. Thought they’d care more about their golden boy.” When they arrived at the crime scene, my parents were shocked. They were furious at how brutal the killer had been. They just didn’t realize the mangled mess was their own son. 1 My body was found in an abandoned building. Construction workers were puking their guts out while they called 911. My parents rushed over from Ethan’s victory celebration. The forensics guy frowned and told them to put on masks. My dad was one of the best detectives in the city, and my mom was the chief medical examiner. Even though they’d seen tons of crime scenes, they were shaken up by this one. It was the middle of summer, and the body was bloated and gross. The face was bashed in, just a bloody mess. You couldn’t even tell where the features were. The body was covered in wounds, and the head was barely attached. The stench of decay was horrific. My mom closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and put on her gloves. She started the initial exam. She looked at my body with pity. I’d never gotten that kind of tenderness from her when I was alive. I watched nervously as she took off a blood-soaked ring from my finger. I’d had a bunch of identical rings made for my family, but Ethan’s didn’t fit, and my parents had yelled at me. “You just wanted to cause trouble, to make Ethan feel bad!” “Jason, you may be our biological son, but Ethan has lived with us for eighteen years. He’ll always be more important to us.” Their angry words still echoed in my ears, but I still believed they loved me. Surely they would recognize the ring! But Mom just emotionlessly handed it to her assistant to bag as evidence. I shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up. I never really existed for them. Even though I was their son. My older brother, Mark, told me they adopted Ethan because they couldn’t find me after I was kidnapped. He said I was still their favorite. But when I finally came home, there wasn’t a place for me anymore. I was the one who didn’t belong. Dad finished looking over the scene and sighed. “So, what do we have?” he asked Mom. Mom took off her gloves and rubbed her forehead. “Victim’s around twenty. Cause of death looks like a slashed throat. He was tortured for a while before he died.” “Brutal. This is gonna be a media circus. We gotta solve this fast.” Dad lit a cigarette and took a long drag, like he was worried. Even in death, I was causing him problems. The forensics guy said, “Killer’s still out there. Tell your family to be careful. Keep your kids inside at night.” Mom snapped, “Ethan’s always careful. Jason, on the other hand… I can’t control him.” The forensics guy was an old friend of theirs. He knew all about our family drama. Dad rubbed his right shoulder. “Your shoulder acting up again, Liam?” the forensics guy asked. Dad waved it off. “It’s fine. I put on one of those patches Jason bought me…” He stopped mid-sentence. The son they called rebellious was the one who cared about their health. The forensics guy patted Dad’s back. “Be nice to Jason. He’s your real son, after all.” Dad shook his head. “Ethan had a tennis tournament the other day. He really wanted Jason to be there. But Jason just ignored our calls. Ethan was so disappointed he only got second place. He’s been missing for days. Who knows where he is, probably dead in a ditch somewhere. Kids you don’t raise yourself are never any good.” Listening to them blame me made me feel like I was freezing. Mom, Dad, I didn’t want to run away. I just… couldn’t come back. The ungrateful kid you always complained about died the day you went to Ethan’s tennis match. My body is right here in front of you. 2 At the case briefing, the detectives all looked grim after hearing Mom’s report. My body was so messed up they couldn’t identify me by my face. The abandoned building wasn’t the primary crime scene, which made things harder. Dad told his team to canvass the area for leads. “I need the medical examiner to go over the body again, see if there’s anything new. Get that DNA to the lab ASAP.” He told Mom that and rushed out with his team. They cared more about the body than they ever cared about me. Mom used to stroke Ethan’s hair and tell him being a medical examiner was a noble profession, speaking for the dead. I would watch Ethan nod and agree, then wipe his hair off in disgust as soon as she turned around. That time, I slapped him, and Dad shaved my head as punishment. Now, Mom touched my dead hair with a sad look. “Such a tragic death. His family must be devastated.” I grimaced. My family would probably be happy I was gone. Maybe Mark would be sad for a bit. Mom ran her gloved hand across my back. There was a large burn scar there, from when I was kidnapped. When I first came home, Mom saw it when I was changing and said, with a mix of surprise and disgust, “What happened to your back? That’s disgusting! Don’t scare Ethan.” Could she recognize me from the scar? I bit my lip, sweat beading on my forehead. But then Mom just muttered dismissively, “Not from this.” Her assistant suddenly gasped. “Dr. Lewis! There’s a piece of paper in the victim’s stomach!” Mom’s eyes widened. She took it and sighed. “It’s been corroded by stomach acid. We’ll see if forensics can make anything of it.” Her phone rang, playing Ethan’s favorite song. She pulled off her gloves and hurried into the hallway. Her voice was sickly sweet. “Honey, what is it? Mommy’s working.” “Tomorrow?” Mom paused, then said through gritted teeth, “Of course we’ll be there to cheer you on! Your brother is out of town on business.” Ethan’s whiny voice carried down the hall. “Love you, Mom! I still wish Jason could come. It’s okay if he doesn’t want to. I guess it’s normal he doesn’t like me, since I’ve stolen all your and Dad’s love all these years.” Even though he pretended to be close to me in front of our parents, Ethan had been sabotaging me since the day I came home. From experience, I knew Mom was about to start yelling at me. “You’re our precious baby! Jason is… nothing! He steals from us, he bullies you. He doesn’t deserve to be our son.” “Don’t worry. Even if he has to crawl there, I’ll make him come to your match!” Ethan chuckled. “Dad called earlier and told me to be careful. You should remind Jason too, Mom.” “You take care of yourself. I don’t care what Jason does, as long as he doesn’t die in front of me. Who cares where he goes to screw around?” Mom always sounded so disgusted when she talked about me. Maybe it was because the son they found wasn’t educated and sophisticated. They didn’t even change my last name when I came back. In their minds, Ethan was their only son. When they worried about his safety, they didn’t even think about me, their actual son. I wonder how they’ll react when they find out how I died. After all, Ethan had a hand in it, and so did they. 3 After gently telling Ethan to go to bed, Mom got a call from my sister, Olivia. “Olivia, when are you coming back? Your brother wants you at his match!” Mom didn’t even let Olivia speak. The day I came home, Mom and Dad were busy comforting a crying Ethan. Only Mark took my hand, led me inside, and told me not to be scared. The only warmth I felt in that house came from Mark. Olivia sounded surprised. “Is this about Jason’s math competition? I thought that wasn’t until next month…” Mom angrily interrupted. “Jason, Jason, Jason! Ethan is the brother you’ve known for years! How many times do I have to tell you? Jason learned all sorts of bad habits while he was gone! He doesn’t deserve to be a Lewis.” Olivia sighed, clearly not understanding Mom’s hostility. “Mom, don’t listen to everything Ethan says. Jason is kind and hardworking. You’d see that if you paid more attention to him.” “I just tried calling him. He didn’t answer. He hasn’t responded to my texts either. Is he not home?” Mom scoffed. “He can do whatever he wants. I can’t chain him up, can I? He’s probably hiding out, waiting for us to come looking for him! He’s done this before.” “He just doesn’t want to go to Ethan’s match. He’ll be calling us tomorrow, crying and apologizing.” The last time I “disappeared,” Ethan had locked me in the school bathroom during summer break. The school was empty, no one could hear me yelling. I finally climbed out, covered in filth, and limped home with a twisted ankle. Dad greeted me with a slap across the face, and Mom screamed at me. “Ethan said he saw you going into a motel with a girl! How could you be so shameless?!” I couldn’t defend myself. I just watched Ethan smirk. Olivia cleaned my wounds and said softly, “Mom and Dad love you, they just don’t know how to show it.” But I knew that compared to the charming and clever Ethan, I would always be the less loved son. The scales of affection would always tip in his favor. Not mine. If I were still alive, I’d be making them soup and bringing it to the station when they had to work late. But this time, I wouldn’t be showing up to apologize like they expected. I was dead. The forensics lab came back with results. The paper was a shopping list. The killer had shoved it in my mouth, taunting me. “Buying this for your parents? They’ll probably just throw it in the trash.” Dad frowned. “What is this place?” The forensics guy paused. “I looked it up. It’s a shop that sells good luck charms and little gift bags.” When Mom, Dad, and the other officers walked into the shop, the owner jumped. She took the torn piece of paper and looked at the number in the corner. She flipped through her order book. “A young man ordered these a while ago. He said they were for his parents, since they had dangerous jobs.” “He never came to pick them up, and he stopped answering his phone.” The owner held out two little red bags. “The symbols on them are for peace, happiness, and a long life.” Dad took the bags and sighed. “Do you have security footage from that day?” The owner nodded. “He was a quiet kid. He spent a long time picking out the designs. I remember him clearly.” When they played the footage, everyone went silent. Mom swallowed hard, staring at the screen. “That boy… he looks like Jason.” The owner said, “Jason? That’s the name on the order!” Dad’s face paled, but he tried to stay calm. “Must be a coincidence. Jason’s probably out there somewhere, laughing at us!” “Are you in on this with him? You’d lie to the police?” His phone rang. Mom answered, her voice shaky. “Detective Lee?” The voice on the other end was urgent. “Dr. Lewis, we have the DNA results back from the victim.”