Soon, Sam was left in an empty house with the request for divorce written before him.
He granted it to her, his heart breaking when he realised that she was better off without him.
It had been just over ten months since his son’s broken body lay before him, the bright lights of the smashed car illuminating him like a museum show piece.
It was an image that would stay with him forever.
As would the name.
Miles Hillock.
Twenty years old, Miles had been drunk behind the wheel when he had veered off the road and snatched Sam’s son from him. Sam had known because he had watched the man exceed the limit at the very pub he had been attending. But circumstances beyond his understanding saw the sentence reduced to a measly eighteen months.
That was what his son’s life had been worth.
Eighteen months.
After nine, Miles walked with good behaviour, emerging from the prison a different man. The handsome face had been replaced by one that had experienced horrors. His previous calmness replaced with a skittishness that betrayed the abuse a pretty boy like him had suffered. Horrified with the crime he had committed, Miles had moved into the very flat Sam was staring at, spending his days drinking in the empty hope that it would erase his memories.
Theo had begged Sam not to do this.
But he understood.
Sam slid open the glove compartment and removed the eight-inch serrated blade, the knife that had been strapped to his boot for a number of miles in the deserts of Afghanistan. A knife he had used to remove the innards of a violent terrorist who was about to unload his gun on Theo during Project Hailstorm.
It seemed a lifetime ago.
The scars that stained his shrinking chest were a memento to the times where he was part of society. A weapon for the same country that valued his son’s life at less than two years.
At that moment, the cracked, white door that sat between the chicken shop and a closed estate agents opened, and Sam felt his heart stop. Miles Hillock stepped out into the flicking glow of the lamp post, the brightness revealing him to Sam like a prize on the world’s cruellest game show.
The man seemed smaller than when he had been sent to prison, the nine-month stint clearly breaking him and he walked with his arms crossed against his chest, literally holding himself together. The wind swept by, causing some of the blossom on the trees to filter through the cool evening sky. Sam had been waiting nearly a year to be this close to the man who took his son, and as he watched him meekly walk up the street towards the newsagents, he felt a surge race through his body.
It wasn’t of anger.
It wasn’t of vengeance.
It was guilt.
Guilt that this was what his life had become. That he had let his son only spend five years on the earth before letting fate lead him away. That he had sat helplessly, staring into the abyss whilst his wife begged him for his support.
Guilt that he had let her leave.
Guilt that he would never have asked her to stay.
Not when he knew what the future held. A lifetime in prison didn’t scare Sam. He had stared down the barrel of enough guns and had been under heavy fire in the treacherous mountains of Iraq. Coming face to face with a murderer or a corrupt prison guard would carry the same amount of threat as a bubble wrapped marshmallow.
Sam felt guilty for the life he had worked hard for and the family he had literally walked through a war zone to return to. It had all crumpled to ash.
All at the hands of the man emerging from the off licence. A blue plastic bag hung from his hands, the plastic wrapped tightly around numerous cans of cheap alcohol. With quick steps and frightened glances over his shoulder, Miles Hillock made his way back to the door to his flat, for another evening of guilt-ridden solitude, endless tears, and the mind-numbing power of alcohol. He shut the door behind him and headed up to his flat, already cracking open a can and guzzling its contents.
He was going to drink himself to death.
Outside on the street, Sam pushed open the car door and stepped out onto the empty High Street that ran through Edgware like a concrete vein.
With the knife hidden inside his jacket, he headed towards the door, hell bent on helping Miles succeed.
Sam stared into the mirror, the cheap Braun beard trimmer had been surprisingly strong against his thicker, longer hair. The sink was now filled with clumps of his brown hair, entwined with the cheeky grey ones that were becoming more regular. In the army, the boys would quickly buzz each other’s hair, the sweltering heat soon made a fool of those who relented. Sam wasn’t exactly a stylist, but he had a steady hand and was able to trim his hair down to a passable level, with a shorter grade around the sides. The grade four on top left just enough hair to look presentable and his hair line and natural curl to the front gave it the hint of style.
He kept the beard, enjoying the thickness of the brown and grey coating for his strong jaw. It wasn’t scraggly, but it was enough to hide his skin from the bitter cold.
For the first time in a few days he felt refreshed.
The evening before had been difficult, the torture of that man, no matter how horrifying his actions had been, had wiped Sam out. Now, with a good night’s sleep, he felt refreshed.
He also had the information the man had spat out as he begged for his life before Sam had melted his arm with acid. Sam had taken the man to Northwick Park Hospital just outside of Harrow and dumped him on the
