Prologue

"He told me how he felt…"

Squeezing, tighter and tighter, crushing his chest. All the tension in his shoulders spread down his arms so hard that they were screaming at him.

"…and I guess I had feelings too…"

His throat was raw, like tiny knives were scratching at it incessantly. He could feel every inch of throat rough and tight. His heart was pulsing, hard. The sounds of the bar became fuzzy, it was now only her voice, just her voice with him.

"we kissed."

He snapped.

From there the rage roared and roared. It had shot down his arm and into the glass that shattered the frame on the wall then fired through his legs making them kick chairs over. Compelling his whole physical being with such energy it sparked and crackled through him, punching and kicking and destroying. When it had finished scorching his body it flooded up to his head, contorting his mouth and poisoning his thoughts.

When his brother had left and he was alone it bubbled in his stomach unpleasantly, insides squirming as he thought of what his love had told him. Still in pain he tried to drive it off, roving round town aimlessly, shaking himself almost unconsciously. Gritting his teeth and then releasing the tension through a strangled yell, grunt of pain, wordless call into the night.

And then he had seen it. The object of his hurt and anger and hate; just strolling down the road, not a care in the world. As he drove nearer, his gaze both focused, every detail sharpening unbearably, and clouded so he couldn't see clearly at all.

He stopped and leapt out. From there he became blind until he found himself in an alley in the night's frost, shivering with the cold, quaking with anger. He looked down at his hands, the skin on his knuckles broken open. He looked at the floor and saw where he'd broken them.

His opponent lay still. Worry biting through the fading anger he looked round furtively before bending down and reaching for a frozen wrist.

He couldn't believe it, he just couldn't…

Oh Lord have mercy.