The Fracker Prince of a Poisoned Dynasty

§PROLOGUE

The lie had a sound.

It was the whisper of expensive wool against a clinic’s sterile hallway, the soft click of a designer heel on polished linoleum.

From my position crouched in the frozen ornamental shrubs outside, the world had narrowed to a single pane of glass and the two figures framed within it.

Her, Claire, my Claire, haloed by the cold fluorescent light.

And him, Garrett, the man I called my brother.

I’d finally done it. The money was safe in my pocket, a greasy, hard-earned stack of cashier’s checks that felt heavier than any drilling equipment I’d ever hauled.

I was coming home a hero.

Then I heard her voice, filtered through the thick glass, as clear and cutting as a shard of ice.

“He said he’ll have the full amount in a few days,” Garrett said, his voice a low murmur I had learned to trust. “Do we need to keep generating the fake treatment invoices?”

My wife, my Claire, smoothed a wrinkle from the sleeve of her cashmere coat. The watch on her wrist, a delicate, unfamiliar piece of jewelry, caught the light.

“No, that won’t be necessary,” she said, her tone dismissive, bored. “He’s been pathetic enough these past few years. He didn’t even tell us when he broke his leg last winter.”

Garrett’s voice sharpened. “Cordelia, are you sure? What if he’s faking it? The Marchand family fortune is… considerable.”

Cordelia. Not Claire.

“And what about Felicity?” Garrett pressed on. “She might not adapt to living with… Graham.”

Graham. Not Gray.

My six-year-old daughter, my precious Felicity, then wrapped her arms tightly around Garrett’s neck. “I don’t want a man like that to be my daddy,” she declared. “Living with him would be bad luck.”

She burrowed her face into Garrett’s shoulder. “Uncle Garrett, I wish you were my daddy.”

Claire—Cordelia—hesitated for only a heartbeat. Then, a fond smile touched her lips.

“Alright,” she conceded softly. “We’ll give the test another six months.”

I pulled the checks from my pocket. The crisp paper felt like ash.

Slowly, deliberately, I let them fall, one by one, into the grimy slush of the gutter.

They didn’t need a test.

I would simply leave.

§01

Two days earlier, I was a different man.

I was a man fueled by hope, a raw, desperate thing that tasted like stale coffee and gasoline.

My pickup truck, a machine held together by rust and sheer force of will, rattled across the vast, frozen expanse of the Dakota plains.

For forty-eight hours, the world had been a blur of white snow, grey sky, and the hypnotic yellow lines of the highway.

In my head, I played the scene over and over.

Me, walking through the door. Felicity’s shriek of joy. Claire’s tired, beautiful smile.

I would hand her the checks, all two hundred thousand dollars of them, and say, “It’s over. The treatments are paid for. We can be a family again.”

At a desolate, wind-battered gas station somewhere in Nebraska, I spent the last of my cash.

Not on more coffee, but on a small, cheap snow globe from a dusty souvenir rack.

Inside, a tiny plastic deer stood in a swirl of artificial snow.

Felicity had always wanted one.

I held it in my calloused palm, the small globe a perfect, self-contained world of peace.

This was what I was fighting for. This little sphere of tranquility.

I was so close.

I was driving home to a life I had earned with my own blood and bone.

A life built on the simple, solid truth of a father’s love.

Or so I believed.

§02

The clinic’s automated call came as I was parking, a cheerful, robotic voice delivering a death sentence to the man I was just hours ago.

“Mr. Redford, this is a reminder… your account balance of two hundred thousand dollars is now past due…”

I killed the engine, the silence in the cab suddenly deafening. The little snow globe sat on the passenger seat, a mocking souvenir from a world that no longer existed.

A sharp rap on the window made me jump.

It was her. Claire. Cordelia.

Her eyes, when she saw me, weren't filled with warmth. They were wide with the panic of someone whose carefully constructed stage had just been crashed.

“Graham,” she said, her voice tight. “You’re back. You didn’t call.”

“Just missed you guys,” I said, the words tasting like ash.

“Next time, let me know. I would have picked you up.”

I nodded, playing my part one last time.

I followed her into the clinic, the familiar squeak of my work boots a funeral march for the man I used to be. The joy had curdled into a cold, heavy calm. The kind of calm that comes after the storm has already destroyed everything you own.

The scene inside the private waiting room was a perfect picture of a family I was never a part of.

Felicity was giggling, perched on Garrett’s lap. They looked so natural. A father and a daughter.

As I stepped into the room, Felicity’s laughter died. A flicker of relief crossed her face when I didn't rush to hug her.

Garrett, ever the performer, smiled at me. A predator’s smile.

“Graham, good to see you, man,” he said. “Don’t mind Felicity. She’s just a little shy with strangers.”

We’d seen each other less than a month ago. The lie was so insulting, I almost laughed.

My mind flashed back. A year ago. A faulty valve had exploded on the rig, sending a shard of metal into my thigh. The pain was blinding. My first call, from a staticky satellite phone, was to Garrett.

“Just a scratch,” I’d told him, downplaying it. “But I might need surgery. Should I tell Claire?”

“No, man, don’t worry her,” he’d said, his voice dripping with concern. “You know how she gets. You focus on healing up. I’ll take care of everything here. I’ll make sure they don’t miss you for a second.”

Download the Novellia app, Search 【 796213 】reads the whole book.