Review: Empathy By Ker Dukey

Blake:
I'm a brother
I am a police detective
I am a contract killer
I don't want to love
I don't want to feel

I don't want ... EMPATHY 

They say some people are born with decreased activity in the front central lobe causing them a deficiency in empathy. Maybe that’s true about me but whether I was born this way or created in a moment of evil, empathy was something I didn’t possess until her green eyes met mine in the mirror and I couldn’t take her life. 

I didn’t want to feel, didn’t want this woman in my life complicating how I lived but she was there at every turn. Sent to haunt me for my sins. Her light so bright she provoked a shadow from everyone she touched. When a job turns bad quickly altering my life forever I’m forced to feel. When nothing is making sense I’m forced to face truths I never would recover from. When life drowns you in its cruelty you don’t know which way the current will drag you or who you’ll become once you re-surface. 

Melody
I was a daughter
I was a student
I was a victim
Did I have his love?
Did I make him feel?
Did I have his empathy?

When the actions of a soulless killer forces sorrow into my veins I never dreamed the man healing my wounds would be the one to leave the worst scar. His love would scar my soul. Scars are permanent; I will never feel the relief from them. Will I learn to live with them, remember why I have them and learn never to let him close enough to inflict more? Will I eventually cover them… like tattoos coating them with new memories, new love and new starts? I didn’t know these answers because the pain was too suffocating, the only thing I knew was they will always be under the surface lingering. He had scars too, from his sins. There is nothing that can cover them, they were too deep, too ugly, too dark and they marked us both forever.

1-click on Amazon  Empathy

Review

Many of my favorite reads fall into the dark and dangerous genre. Empathy is not only dark and
dangerous but also twisted and deprived.

Melody is a college student with a bright future from a good family. She hasn't made any friends until she comes across an intriguing, egotistical and broody Ryan.

"I wear black because I happen to look good in black.  I don't look at people often because when I do, chicks think I want to f... them and guys think i want to fight them. I don't talk to people because its rare I find anyone worth engaging in conversation."

Melody soon meets Blake after running into him, literally. He comes off as a jerk however they have an attraction to each other.

We learn about Blake and Ryan's tragic past that has negatively molded them both.  That's what we led to believe, sneaky and well written. Kur Dukey does a good job keeping the truth well hidden.

Melody is summoned home for a family meeting. She decides to drive and arrives late at night to find her family home ajar and revealing a tragedy.  As soon as she's  is able to leave Melody heads back to college so she does not have to deal with her brother.

When at college Melody begins to adjust. Blake has become obsessed with Melody and begun

stalking her before he was assigned to her case.

"When your story is written on a piece of paper and that paper gets crumpled up and thrown into a shredder you can piece the tatters back together although the damage remains. So does your story,you just have to continue to write even if the paper isn't perfect."

Melody does breakdown one rainy evening and Ryan is there eerily watching however  Blake comes to the rescue and helps her feel again.  Blake also begins to feel again because of Melody.

The ending brings an unexpected twist. We discover the truth and its a doozy. If you enjoy dark and twisted stories put this on your list.

"You snared me in your captivating hold, you re-wakened me and you've slowly been absorbing my soul every night since."

Puya Chilensis