Lost In The Dark (‘Lost’ #1)

CHAPTER 1

ELI

“Dad, please just try to rest,” I pleaded as he turned in the bed and reached for me. I stood from the chair I had been stationed in at his bedside for days now, and took his hand, hoping to settle him.

“N-no. I…I have to…to tell you something important,” he told us breathlessly, the words forced out through the pain he was in.

I wished there was more I could do, but the nurse, who we hired a couple of weeks earlier, had already assured us he had been given the maximum pain meds she could administer. It had been weeks like this, my father, who had always been this imposing figure throughout my life, now laid in his bed, unable to move. He was nothing but skin and bone. The man who had terrified me as a child, and judged my adult life as one failure after another, was now long gone. In his place was this frail old man who was slipping away with every moment that passed.

“We know dad,” Asher interjected from where he sat at my side. He glanced to me and I saw the resentment brewing behind his softly spoken tone.

My dad had never been a good man. He had raised the two of us with an iron fist and we had suffered because of it. We had both agreed to be at his side though in these last days, because he had no one else who cared enough to be there. I had the feeling Asher, my brother, was beginning to regret agreeing to it all now though.

“You already told us a dozen times. We’ll take care of the business and keep it running. The business comes first.” His tone sounded calm but I could see the ire all over my brother’s face as he spoke.

Who could blame him? The business had always come first for our father; before us, before our mom, before everything. It was very likely the reason our mom had taken her life when I was barely ten years old. She just couldn’t take anymore of the violent, angry tyrant she had married.

It was also why Asher had joined the military at twenty years old, desperate to escape not only my father, but all of the expectation piled on him that he would one day takeover the Lyle empire.

He returned home again two years ago, scarred by all he had seen and not the same brother I had grown up with. He had taken his place at the head of the business, seemingly no longer caring about his future and the dreams he had once held. Now he was cold, and standoffish, his only focus the business, and training in the gym during his every other waking moment. He had been changed greatly by whatever he saw in his time overseas, and I worried about him a lot, almost as much as he seemed to constantly worry about me.

I worked for the family business too, but my father would never have handed me the reins. To him I was never strong enough to head the empire he had spent forty years amassing. He liked to tell me often that I was too sensitive and soft, and he loved to put me down. I’d stopped allowing it to affect me a long time ago though. I did what was asked of me in the business each day, then I got the hell out of there and turned my focus to my real interest – painting.

“No,” our father gasped. “L-listen to me. Th-there’s s-something else. You n-eed to know.”

“Okay, tell us. We’re listening,” I told him as I straightened his pillows, hoping it would help him to breathe. He was hooked up to oxygen, via a tube beneath his nose, but the cancer had ravaged his lungs. All of those years of smoking were coming back to bite him in the ass.

“Th…there was a woman,” he began, and Asher looked to me and rolled his eyes. We both knew there had been so many women over the years, both before and after our mom took her life. “Ruth. She…she w-worked for us. Ruth Brooks. You h-have to find her.”

“I don’t think we’ll have time to run the business, and track down every woman you fucked over the last forty years, dad,” Asher told him dryly.

“No! Listen, God damn it!” dad snapped as he turned his rage filled eyes on both of us. It shocked me to realise the tyrant was still in there somewhere. “You h-have to find Ruth because sh-she had a child. M-my child. I turned her away when she t-told me. I sh-shouldn’t have done that. You h-have a…a sister,” he continued, the words causing a fit of coughs by the end.

The nurse hurried over and tried to help him get resettled higher up the pillows, handing him water, and adjusting his oxygen. The entire time his eyes remained fixed on the two of us. I looked to Asher to gauge his reaction. Could this be true? Could we have a sister?

“What exactly do you expect us to do about it?” Asher asked coldly, once the coughing had stopped.

“She may need h-help. I didn’t help her. I r-regret that. I should have t-taken care of her. At least s-sent money, but I just fired Ruth and chased her off with threats. You h-have to find my daughter, You have t-to take care of her.”

“So you knew you had a child out there and you didn’t even provide money to care for her?” I asked with shock and disgust. My father may be a tyrant, but I never thought he’d be so cold hearted to his own blood.

“Y-your mother. She would have f-found out. I had no choice,” he gasped.

“Mom knew damned well that you were sleeping around behind her back,” Asher hissed as he buried his face in his hands.

“J-just promise me. Ruth Brooks. Y-you have to find her and y-your sister. You h-have to make up for my mistake.”

“We’re going to spent the rest of our fucking lives making up for your mistakes, dad,” Asher spat bitterly.

We sat silently as my father drifted into sleep, his wheezing breaths getting louder and slower with every single one.

“It won’t be much longer,” the nurse told us both as she came to straighten the heavy blanket over our father.

“You think he’s telling the truth?” I asked Asher. “Do we have a sister?”

“Who knows? The way he fucked around we probably have dozens out there,” Asher shrugged.

“Are we going to look into it? Find this Ruth Brooks? We should know her, right? If we have a sister out there we should at least meet her?”

“Half-sister,” Asher corrected. “I’ll speak to Kane about someone looking into it, but don’t get your hopes up, Eli. It’s probably bullshit. I don’t even think he knows what he’s saying right now.”

“Okay,” I agreed with a nod. But a sister? Wouldn’t it be nice to have a sister in our lives? We had both only ever really had each other to rely on. Our mom died when we were young, but even before that, she suffered with depression and spent so much of her time shut in her room, asleep. Our father was certainly not what anyone would consider loving or caring.

I’d always had Asher to look out for me, and to protect me as much as he could, and I tried to always do the same for him. Since a very young age we’d known we were all the family we ever really needed. No matter what we always had each other’s backs. That was what had gotten us through the miserable childhood we’d had.

We had good friends too – Adam and Jordan. Adam had been Asher’s best friend since they were around five years old. Jordan was his kid brother, and over the years they had become family to us – like brothers. They both lived with us at our place outside the city, and had done for several years. We knew we could always count on them, just as they could us, but having a sister – that would be different, wouldn’t it? I wanted to meet her so badly, if she really did exist. I had longed for more family for so long. Maybe this was our chance?

ASHER

I followed Eli into our house and slammed the door closed behind me. It was such a fucking relief to be home. Two weeks had passed since my father landed his bombshell about our supposed sister, the afternoon before he died.

Now, finally, the funeral was over and it had almost fucking killed me to see the whole damned day through. There had been so many mourners, mainly people my father did business with – not one of whom had truly liked the man. He had been a bastard, in both his personal and business affairs. He treated everyone like they were beneath him, no matter who they were, and it did not make him many friends. But he had allies – people who needed my father and his business dealings on their side. That was who had been at the fucking funeral – people who feared their deals and alliances with our business would be destroyed if they didn’t attend and lavish Eli and I with their false platitudes and bullshit sympathy.

“It went well then?” Adam asked as he walked into the open hallway from the kitchen and looked at Eli and me. I glanced to my brother and instantly felt like shit for not speaking with him the whole drive home. He’d had just as shit a day as me, and he was struggling. It was plain to see in his slouched posture and tense face. I should have shielded him more from all of the bullshit throughout the day. He tended to be more sensitive than me, always had been. He felt things deeply, where as I generally just got pissed off at most things.

“It was okay,” Eli shrugged.

“It was a complete shit show, just as I expected, but it’s over now. He’s gone and buried,” I added as I approached Eli and wrapped my arm around his shoulders. “How about we get out of these fucking suits and have a drink, yeah? I think we could both use one,” I suggested as I tried to force myself to relax for his benefit.

Outside of this house I was forced to wear the armor my father had so carefully fitted me with piece by piece as I grew up. It was the same armor he himself had worn. The armor he felt was needed to present the powerful, almost dictatorial image he wanted his business to be led with. The stiff, uncomfortable, designer suits I wore to the office each day were a part of that. But there, in my home with my brother and the two men I considered as good as, I didn’t need to pretend. I could be myself, or at least as much of me as was left since I returned from that fucking desert. That was who Eli needed in that moment and I knew it.

“I made food. I thought you might both be hungry?” Adam told us as he looked from me to Eli with concern.

Adam was a good man. He had been my best friend since we were little kids. He had always had my back and I knew he was one of very few people I could count on, no matter what. He had wanted to be at the funeral with Eli and I, but I had refused to allow him to go through that bullshit. He had been through enough in his life.

His entire family had been in a terrible car accident about ten years ago. The car had caught fire and Adam had only had time to save Jordan – his younger brother. His parents both died, the car too engulfed in flames for Adam to get to them in time. He’d tried. He had the scars to prove how hard he’d tried, but it had been too late.

Injuries caused in the accident had seen him prescribed strong pain meds. Mixed with the guilt he was drowning in, he turned to the meds to cope. When the pills stopped, he turned to street drugs and for years, no matter how hard or how many times I tracked him down and tried to help, there was nothing I could do, except take care of Jordan – his kid brother, and pray he would come to me for help one day before it was too late.

That day had come seven years ago. He had turned up on our doorstep beaten half to death and desperate to get help. He’d spent some time in rehab, then moved in with us. All these years later he had stayed clear of the drugs, not that he didn’t struggle sometimes – I knew he did - but when I noticed him being too quiet or down, I dragged him to the home gym and we worked out until we could barely stand. It worked for him and helped me to exercise some of my own demons.

Now he managed our house, while Eli and I handled the business. I had told him time and again he didn’t need to do it. I was happy to have him and Jordan living with us. They were our family, but Adam was a man of principles and refused to live rent free if he wasn’t contributing. Now, I knew without Adam running the house and keeping us all fed, Eli and I would have starved to death. He kept us all going and we knew it.

“I could definitely eat. I hate all those tiny fucking canapes the caterers put on,” I replied. “Just give us ten to get changed.”

“No problem. Meet you in the kitchen,” Adam agreed.

Eli was worrying me with how quiet he was being, not a word uttered as I followed him up the stairs. I knew the day had been a lot for him. Not because we had buried our father. No – I knew we were both pretty grateful the old bastard was gone. He had made our lives as miserable as he could by putting the both of us down at every opportunity. It was all of the pretense of the day that had gotten to Eli. He didn’t like to lie, and he hated dishonesty, and it had certainly been a day of that, and much more bullshit, ass kissing from every person who had attended.

“Eli?” I called as he headed for his room. He paused and turned to me. He looked completely exhausted and so vulnerable in that moment. I wished I could have spared him the funeral. “It’s over now, brother. The old man is gone and we’re going to start living our lives without his bullshit.”

“I know. I’m just tired,” he told me.

“We’ll be okay now. You know that, right? You don’t have to work at the company anymore. I know you hate it there.” I hated it there too. It had never been in my life plan to work for my father, and it had certainly never been a dream to take over the business, which thrived on pouncing on other dying businesses. It wasn’t who I was.

It was why I had enlisted, with dreams of becoming a SEAL. And I’d gotten there, serving eight years before I realized my head was too fucked up for me to keep going. I had seen and done too much. When our last op went badly sideways and we lost a member of our team, it was the end for me. I got out and with no other direction to go, I had taken my place at Lyle Industries . I hated every fucking moment since, but I was determined to make the business work the way I wanted it to, now that the old bastard was gone.

“You hate it too, Ash. I’m not leaving you to do it alone. We’re a team, but I want things to change. I can’t profit from other businesses failures anymore. It’s not right,” he added.

“I know. We’re going to turn it all around. I have plans, and ideas that will make the old bastard turn in his grave,” I laughed.

“That, I can definitely get on board with,” Eli agreed, and finally he smiled just a little.

“Good. Meet you downstairs?” He nodded in reply, then headed into his room.

Our house was modest compared to the mansion, or mausoleum, more like, that we had been raised in. I had started talking with an architect as soon as I turned twenty one and got my trust fund. I wanted to build a place where I could bring Eli, as he had just turned eighteen. I was serving at the time, but I wanted Eli out from under my father’s tyrannical grasp. He was miserable and slipping into depression just like our mom had suffered with. I was so worried about him and I knew I had to get him out.

The house was modest, a modern construction our father completely abhorred. The rooms were open and light. The entire ground floor was one open plan living space with huge windows and several sets of doors out onto the expansive grounds. In the basement I designed my dream home gym and we had an indoor pool for Eli, who liked to do laps every single day. Upstairs were six large bedrooms – enough for the both of us, and Adam and Jordan, with a couple for guests should we ever need them. Then the top floor was all for Eli. I had put enormous skylights in the roof and the huge, open space was flooded with light from those and the windows that were on every side of the space. It was an art studio for him – so he could do what he loved most in the world – paint.

Our father had tried hard to crush Eli’s artistic side, and mocked him relentlessly about it. He thought it made Eli weak and feeble. He didn’t see the strength Eli already had inside of him. Strength he had earned during the years of mental, and some physical abuse he had been forced to endure. Earned by watching his own mother take her life when he was still only a young kid. He never understood my brother and he didn’t want to either.

Getting Eli out had been the right decision. Adam had lived with Eli while I was overseas, and taken care of him. And Eli? He had thrived, able to paint when he wanted and live without fear of the next insult or hit. He’d gone to college and focused mainly in art, much to my fathers disapproval, but it didn’t matter what he thought. I had a sizeable trust fund from my mother and I could afford to pay his college fees.

Now art was his true passion and he was so damned talented too. He’d had several shows where his paintings had been displayed and sold out in a single night. It could be his career if he wanted it to be, or he could just lock himself away in his studio and do it for himself, since he too had his own trust fund from our mother, not to mention profits from Lyle Industries . He didn’t need to work a day in his life, and yet, ever since I had taken my place at the company, he had been at my side every step of the way, supporting me. It was just who he was. He cared about the people in his life and there was nothing he wouldn’t do for them.

I slipped into my room and shucked off the uncomfortable suit. I took a quick shower, hoping to wash away the lingering stench of the day, then pulled on shorts and a tee. I wasn’t a suit guy, though I wore one every day for work – just another piece of the armor my father had instilled in me. That was the real me though – comfortable and able to relax in the privacy of my home.

“God, that smells so good. What did you cook?” I asked as I walked into the kitchen and found Adam pulling something from the oven.

“Baked ziti. I thought comfort food might be good,” Adam replied as he set the hot dish down on the counter and pulled plates from the cabinet. “Eli okay?”

“Tired. It was a lot for him today, all those fake assholes and their bullshit. You know he hates that crap,” I explained as I went straight to the refrigerator and pulled out a beer for me and one for Eli. Adam didn’t drink, and for years we had kept alcohol from the house for him, but in the last few years he’d encouraged us to have a beer if we wanted to. He seemed good with it. Alcohol had never been his vice anyway.

“He looked like shit.”

“I know. I think he’ll be okay now though. The old bastard can’t fuck with him anymore, and I’ll try to keep him away from the assholes I deal with at the office.”

“And you? What are you going to do now? You hate those assholes just as much,” Adam pointed out.

“I do, and I’m going to get rid of them all over time. I have a plan to turn things around. No more profiting from failing businesses. I have the reins now and I’m going to turn it into a company I’m proud to run,” I told him confidently.

“Sounds like a lot of work.”

“It will be, but it’ll be worth it.” If nothing else it would be worth it just because I knew how much my plans would make my father outraged. This would be my final ‘fuck you’ to the old bastard.

“Hey,” Eli greeted as he walked in, also changed into his version of comfortable – paint splattered jeans and a worn looking t-shirt. “Is Jordan back?”

“Nah, not yet. He had a hot date after work. Some woman he met at the coffee shop,” Adam shrugged. “You want ziti?”

“Yes please. It smells so good,” Eli replied.

“Me too. I’m fucking starving now.”

I quickly got out some cutlery and grabbed Adam a soda, then laid it all out at places at the central island in the kitchen. We had a dining table, but rarely used it. I had made sure things in our home were the complete opposite to the formal bullshit we had grown up with. There were no staff, no formal dinners, and no expectations. We all did our bit to keep the place clean, and Adam kept us stocked with groceries. We did have a gardener, but otherwise we were just a family, relaxed and comfortable enough together to be ourselves.

We were all sat eating and chatting, both Adam and I trying to cheer Eli up as much as we could, when my head of security – Kane – came in through the glass doors from the yard.

We had security with us at all times, including on the property when we were home. I’d been left with no choice when three men attempted to kidnap Eli for ransom last year. Luckily, I had walked into the parking lot as they were trying to grab him and had been able to fend them off enough to get my brother in the car and out of there, but I was taking no more risk. Lyle made us very wealthy men and I knew the lengths that could make some desperate men go to.

Kane was ex-military and I had worked with him overseas. When he got out I offered him the job of managing our security, both personal and for the head office building in the city, where Eli and I worked. He also coordinated the security for the other office buildings our company owned and operated around the country. He lived in a separate cottage on our property. I had offered him a room in the house, but like so many of us, he had come out of the military with his own demons. He needed his own place, and so we had built that for him. Now I didn’t know how we had ever managed without him.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt dinner,” he said as he walked in and looked to us all.

“All good. You want some ziti?” Adam offered as he moved to stand.

“No, thanks. I’m fine. I just wanted to update the boss,” he nodded to me. I had told him a hundred times to just call me ‘Asher,’ but he still always referred to me as ‘the boss’ so I had given up trying. “ I have the information you requested.”

“Ruth Brooks?” I had asked him to look into the woman a week ago, needing to know if we really did have a sister or not.

“Yeah. She’s dead. Died nine years ago of heart disease,” he explained.

“Did she have a daughter?” Eli asked, looking much more like himself now. I knew he was excited at the prospect of another family member, but I was worried. Even if there was a sister, what would she think of us when my father – and hers – had just cast her aside before she was even born?

“Yes. Adeline. She’s twenty-six. Worked as a librarian in a tiny town in Ohio until two years ago. Her father is listed as ‘Joseph Lyle’ on the birth certificate,” Kane went on.

“So it’s true?” Eli turned to me with so much hope in his eyes. “We have a sister?”

“Just take a breath. We don’t know for sure yet,” I reminded him. “Where is she now?” I asked as I looked to Kane.

“That’s where things get interesting. Two years ago, Adeline Brooks just dropped off of the face of the earth. No one reported her missing. She just vanished. Then, last week she was hit by a car on a highway, four miles from the strip in Vegas. Apart from the injuries from the hit she took, she also had abrasions around her wrists and ankles, open wounds, and older scars on her back, and was severely malnourished and dehydrated.”

“Fuck. Do they know what happened? Was she taken?” I asked, knowing what the abrasions around her wrists and ankles had to mean.

“Taken? Like kidnapped?” Eli gasped.

“No. She’s saying she has no memory of the last two years, but when they found her she was holding a gun and covered in blood that wasn’t hers.”

“The cops think she’s lying about the memory loss?” I questioned.

“That’s my guess, but she does have a severe head injury from the car hit. Other than the last two years she has never been in trouble with the cops. She lived a quiet life. Spent most of her childhood acting as care giver for her mom, who had Fibromyalgia. She paid her own way through college, then got the job as a librarian. Her credit card statements show no social life at all. She lived like a hermit from what I can find.”

“So someone took her and hurt her, and she what? Shot them? Isn’t that self-defense?” Eli asked as he looked to me with panic.

“Maybe,” Kane nodded. “Except the police have arrested her for killing a senator. They found his body at his home the day after she was found. Single shot to the chest. The cops aren’t buying that he held her. By all accounts he’s an upstanding citizen.”

“And by your account? Did you look into him?”

“Of course.” Kane grinned smugly. “On paper he looks clean, but I found he has memberships under a false name to several BDSM clubs in the area, and Eighteen months ago, not long after the time Adeline went missing, he made a huge cash transfer of twenty thousand dollars to a company I believe to be a front for the skin trade,” Kane explained.

“You think she was trafficked?” I asked. My stomach was churning as it hit me that this girl, who could be our sister, had been through hell.

“It happens. She definitely fits the profile they target. No family. No one to notice her missing and report it.”

“She does have family now though. She has us. We have to go to her, Asher,” Eli told me as he jumped to his feet, looking ready to go immediately.

“Is she in custody?” I asked Kane, and he nodded.

“Police took her in this afternoon, despite her having some pretty extensive injuries. They seem really pissed about the death of this senator.”

“Email me the details. I’ll arrange for an attorney for her,” I told him.

“Everything I have is already in your inbox, boss. I’d act pretty quickly if I were you. Seems like the cops are gonna railroad her for this,” Kane warned me.

“Asher? We have to go to her!” Eli demanded.

“We will, but it will take time. In the meantime I’ll get an attorney out to her. She’ll be okay, Eli. We’ll help her,” I promised him. Even if Adeline wasn’t our sister, she was clearly an innocent woman who had been through hell and needed help. I could give that.

“I’ll make the calls to get the jet ready, and pack us each a bag. Will she need clothes too? Will she have anything if she has been someone’s prisoner? God, she must be so scared,” Eli rambled.

“We’ll get her a few things. I’ll help you,” Adam assured him. “We’ll go to the store and you can make arrangements for the flight on the way.”

“Yeah, okay. Thanks Adam. I’ll just change really quickly,” Eli was gone, running for the stairs before any of us could say another word.

“He’ll be heart broken if it turns out she’s not your sister,” Adam told me with a sigh.

“I know, but what can I do? The girl needs help now. DNA tests will have to wait.”

“I don’t think you need DNA tests, boss. Look at this,” Kane opened the file he was holding and handed me a photo. It was a head shot, likely taken for an ID of some kind.

“Fuck,” Adam gasped.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “No doubting it now.”

The image was the double of Eli, only the feminine version. Long dark hair, Mediterranean coloring from my father’s Italian side of the family, and the eyes – those dark, emerald, green eyes were identical to Eli’s.

Eli had always been the image of our father, while I more resembled our mother with my light hair and bright blue eyes. Eli and I looked nothing alike, but this girl – Adeline – she was so obviously his sister. Our sister. Fuck .