Page 1 of Exile
Prologue
Damon
I always said that if people saw me as the villain, then I'd be their fucking villain. And secretly, a part of me loved it. Most people want to be admired, loved. Why bother with that when you can be feared and respected?
I pride myself on knowing everything, always being in control. Ever since I was dragged into Lilydale, a violation and mockery of my mother’s legacy, I vowed to seek retribution and revenge on my father.
The end goal has always stayed the same—kill him. It was only fair… an eye for an eye, subjecting him to the same fate as Lily Emerson-Dale.
When they started pumping the facility full of patients, a second, albeit equally important goal, emerged—save them. I couldn't save my mother but I could try to save them from my father. And bringing him down at the same time? It was a win-win situation.
It was obvious from the firstrealpatient after me to arrive that these people were not criminals; they were victims, let down by society and the people who were meant to protect them. And now, they were under the control of my fatherand his lapdogs. I swore from that day that I would take back control in every way and shape imaginable. After all, my father's sole purpose in life, aside from accumulating wealth, was to keep me chained and exercise his obsessive need for power over me. It was only fitting that I would take back that control and power from inside the one place he dared not to enter. It’s the perfect resolution and ending—a full circle moment. The great Alexander Dale created Lilydale to cage me and exert dominance, only for me to beat him at his own game.
In his mind, we are nothing but beneath him. He only surrounds himself with people he deems worthy of his presence. In other words, fellow chauvinistic assholes like Arthur Whittingham.
I knew he couldn't resist a power struggle. Any opportunity to strike me down he will take without hesitation. But I had the upper hand since he was afraid to spend more than fifteen minutes inside the walls of the Lilydale Foundation Center, scared he'd be swallowed up by the demons he harbored there and suffocate to a slow death. After all, don't they generally say that people live and breathe their own worst fears and guilt? While the rest of the world might see him as some kind of community hero, he's a spineless bastard haunted by the ghosts of his past actions. Everywhere he looks, everywhere he goes, he sees them. It’s easy to pretend they aren’t real. Except when one of his ghosts is still very much alive, angry, hunting him down.
Me.
He's terrified of meeting the same fate as his wife and losing everything. And well, he should be. Because his day of retribution is coming.
Over time, we grew in strength inside Lilydale. Everything went according to plan—myplan—and in my mind, I had prepared for every possible scenario.
But what I never expected was to end uphere.
In violence and corruption, I found an unexpected peace. An inferno of flames in an otherwise dark abyss—someone to dance with my demons.
My control started to slip, but for once, I didn't mind. Because it was taken by someone I never saw coming.
For the first time since my mother died, I experiencedloveagain—even if I didn't want it. Her vibrant light choked me, wrapping around my black heart like barbed wire, ripping me apart, until finally, she cracked me wide open.
In my own personal hell, I foundher.
Avery.
For the first time, someone saw me as more than their savior. More than a leader and someone to fear.
She wanted to save…me.
So now, it's only fitting that I shoulddiefor her.
Chapter 1
Grey
Warm blood seeps down my knuckles, cascading like a waterfall along my wrist and landing somewhere on the floor. But despite the obvious pain I should be feeling from repeatedly punching the metal door in my room, I feel absolutely nothing except unbridled rage and the aberrant, uncomfortable sensation of panic.
Along with the fresh, copper scented blood that's freely flowing from my split skin, there's sticky, dried patches of murky red on the palms of my hands. And it kills me to know it's not mine.
It's Deadman's. No—I can't call him that right now.
I slam my foot against the door, changing tactics. Except for the loud banging, it achieves nothing, other than sending a shooting pain through my leg. I don't care though. I have to get out of this fucking room. The irony isn't lost on me that I've spent the majority of my time in Lilydale being able to come and go as I please from this cell, and suddenly, when I need to leave it the most, I'm trapped.
Mental images of Avery and Damon are firmly implanted in my mind, burning a hole in my fleeting sanity—if therewas any left to destroy before the events of today. They replay over and over, and I just know Avery's hands are covered in Damon’s blood as well.
Her small, pale hands were frantically pumping Damon's chest, trying to perform CPR before the guards grabbed both of us and ripped us away from Damon's gunmetal pallor, still frame. The fuckers tasered me after I swung at one of them. The last thing I remember before my mind blanked out temporarily is Avery shouting at the top of her lungs—repeatedly calling out mine and Damon's names, before suddenly Theo's was added into the mix with a new air of frenzy. I could make out her threats and pleas, doing everything she possibly could to get control of the situation.
But what even is control? We had it for so long, used to being able to roam freely, making the guards bend to our will. Now… that apparently no longer exists.
