But I wasn’t just here to watch my father’s delusions of grandeur. My eyes were fixed on the man sitting to his right. Richard Vance.
Vance was a billionaire financier on paper, but federal intelligence painted a much darker picture. He was a phantom who moved money for international syndicates, a man currently under sealed indictment by the Department of Justice. My division had been tracking his attempts to acquire legitimate domestic logistics networks to launder his operations. My father’s failing shipping empire was the perfect target. I wasn’t just attending a wedding; I was a commanding officer running a covert surveillance operation on domestic soil, waiting for Vance to make his move.
My father walked past my pillar, his eyes sliding over me as if I were a smudge on the expensive wallpaper. Then, he paused. The recognition hit him, not with affection, but with a sharp spike of annoyance.
He stepped out of his circle of admirers and leaned in close, his breath smelling of expensive scotch and decay.
“Try not to eat too much, Thomas,” he whispered, a smile plastered on his face for the benefit of the room. “We’re paying per head. And frankly, you’re not worth the plate.”
I looked at him. I saw the broken blood vessels in his nose, the fear behind his eyes that he masked with arrogance. A man drowning who thought he was waving.
“Good evening, Father,” I said, my voice neutral.
“Don’t call me that here,” he hissed, the smile never wavering. “You’re a guest. Barely. You’re lucky Michael insisted. If it were up to me, you’d still be in whatever gutter you crawled out of after you ran away to play soldier.”
I didn’t blink. I just watched him walk away. I was here for Michael, my younger brother. He was ten when I was thrown out at eighteen for refusing to join the family business and enlisting in the Army instead. Michael was the only one who had kept in touch. Today he was marrying Sophia, a woman I had met only once but liked immediately. She had steel in her spine and eyes that saw too much.
The wedding photographer began gathering the immediate family near the cake table for the official portrait. Michael spotted me from across the room. His face lit up, and he waved me over, mouthing, Come on!
I took a step forward, moving out of the shadows. My Aunt Linda—a woman who measured human worth in stock options and country club memberships—intercepted me. She moved with the speed of a viper in silk.
“Step aside!” Aunt Linda laughed, a bright, brittle sound that didn’t reach her eyes. She placed a hand firmly on my chest. It was a shove.
“Oh, Thomas, don’t be dense,” she said, lowering her voice but keeping the smile fixed for the cameras. “We only want the successful people in the shot. It’s for posterity. We don’t need a reminder of… well, of your choices.”
Michael saw the interaction. He tried to step out of the line, his face flushing. “Aunt Linda, stop. He’s my brother. He belongs in the photo.”
“He’s a grunt, Michael,” my father cut in, smoothing his tuxedo lapels as he took his place next to the bride. He spoke to the air, as if I were a bad smell. “Let him stand in the back where he belongs.”
I caught Michael’s eye and gave a nearly imperceptible shake of my head. Don’t. I stepped back into the shadows. I accepted the erasure.
Just as the flash popped, capturing their lie of a perfect family, I saw Vance lean over and whisper into my father’s ear. My father’s face went pale. He nodded frantically, his eyes darting around the room before landing squarely on me. He wasn’t calling me over to join the family. He was calling me over to serve the enemy.
My father snapped his fingers. It was a sharp, piercing sound that cut through the soft jazz playing in the background. He gestured aggressively toward the small, private alcove where Richard Vance was now lounging on a velvet settee, a bodyguard the size of a small mountain standing behind him.
I approached slowly, maintaining the docile posture of the invisible man.
“You took your time,” my father muttered as I reached the table. He turned to Vance, his demeanor instantly transforming from tyrannical to sycophantic. “Richard, I apologize. This is Thomas. He’s… well, he’s between things. But he’s useful.”
Vance didn’t even look at me. He was inspecting his manicured fingernails. “Is he, Robert? Because right now, what would be useful is a clean table. Your clumsy waiter spilled an absurdly expensive Cabernet on the mahogany.”
I looked down. A dark red stain was pooling near Vance’s elbow.
