Chapter 25 - Keira
KEIRA
Icurl deeper into the couch’s corner, wrapped in one of Cyrus’s sweaters that drowns my frame. The penthouse feels too quiet when the twins aren’t home. I’ve gotten used to their constant presence—to Ace’s measured movements and Cyrus’s restless energy filling the space around me.
My thumb scrolls mindlessly through Instagram, pausing occasionally on dance videos I’ve saved for choreography inspiration. Three more hours until they’re back from whatever job Xavier assigned them today. They don’t share details, and I’ve stopped asking.
The message loads, and my blood turns to ice water.
I know what happened at the Henderson house. I know what Richard did to you.
My phone slips from suddenly numb fingers, clattering to the hardwood floor. The room spins as memories I’ve spent years burying claw their way to the surface.
Richard Henderson. Foster parent number three. The broken ankle. The locked basement door. The camera.
I lunge for my phone, hands trembling so violently I can barely grip it. I read the message again, hoping I had hallucinated it. The words remain unchanged, accusatory black text against white.
No one knows about the Hendersons. I never reported what happened. Never told a soul. Not even my therapist knows the details.
I check the profile—created three days ago, no posts, no followers. The username offers nothing. My finger hovers over the block button, but something stops me.
How do they know?
My chest constricts, each breath becoming increasingly difficult. I force myself to inhale deeply, using the grounding techniques that got me through the worst panic attacks after I aged out of the system.
Five things I can see.
The glass coffee table.
The city skyline through floor-to-ceiling windows.
Cyrus’s leather jacket draped over a chair.
My ballet shoes by the door.
The message still glaring on my screen.
Four things I can touch.
The soft fabric of Cyrus’s sweater.
The cool leather of the couch.
My hair falling against my cheek.
The hard case of my phone, now slick with sweat.
Three things I can hear.
My own ragged breathing.
Traffic forty floors below.
The hum of the refrigerator.
The Henderson house. Richard.
Who could possibly know?
I stare at the message, my vision blurring at the edges. Richard Henderson. Third foster home in a system that promised safety but delivered anything but.
I was thirteen. Old enough to fight back, but young enough to believe I deserved what happened.
The basement had a single lightbulb. The camera was set up in the corner. His voice was soft and reasonable as he explained that this was how I earned my keep in his household. The click of the deadbolt when he left.
I swallow back bile. Twelve years of therapy, of building new versions of myself—the fearless dancer, the woman who controls her own pleasure with the twins—none of it prepared me for seeing his name on my phone.
My hands won’t stop shaking. I force myself to breathe, counting each inhale and exhale. One, two, three...
No one knows. Not social services—I never filed a report.
I’d packed those memories away so carefully, building walls within my mind.
The system taught me to compartmentalize early—this box for the good days, this box for the beatings, this box for what Richard did—and then, two years after that, William.
Never to be opened again.
Yet here it is, blown wide open by a message from a stranger.
The violation feels fresh, as if Richard’s hands are on me all over again. Someone has been watching me. Someone knows my darkest secret. Someone has stripped away the protection of silence I’ve held onto for a decade.
I curl tighter into the corner of the couch, making myself small the way I used to when I heard his footsteps on the basement stairs. The memory is so vivid that I can smell the damp concrete and feel the cold floor against my skin.
The front door clicks open, and I jolt upright, hastily wiping tears from my face. Voices drift in—Ace’s measured tone countered by Cyrus’s animated responses. I fumble with my phone, fingers trembling as I try to delete the message.
“—next time we should just—” Cyrus stops mid-sentence as they enter the living room. His easy smile vanishes. “Keira?”
I try to school my expression, but know it’s too late. He’s seen my red-rimmed eyes, the tremor in my hands, the way I’m curled protectively around myself.
“What happened?” He crosses the room in three long strides.
“Nothing.” My voice breaks on the word.
Ace appears behind him, his normally impassive face tightening as he studies me. “That’s not nothing.”
I swipe frantically at my screen, desperate to erase the message before they see it. But Cyrus is faster, plucking the phone from my hands with the same fluid grace he uses to take lives.
“Don’t—”
Too late. His eyes narrow as he reads the message, then darken with a dangerous intensity I’ve never seen before.
“Who the fuck is Richard Henderson?” The deceptive softness in his voice makes my skin prickle. “And what did he do to you?”
Ace moves to read over his brother’s shoulder. His expression doesn’t change, but the temperature in the room seems to drop several degrees.
“Keira.” Ace’s voice leaves no room for evasion. “Answer the question.”
My throat closes. I stare at the floor, at my hands, at anything but their faces. The silence stretches between us like a live wire.
“Keira,” Cyrus repeats, kneeling in front of me. His fingers grip my chin, forcing my gaze to his. “Who is he?”
I try to speak, but nothing comes out. The memories press against the back of my eyes—Richard’s basement, the camera’s red light, his hands. My body remembers what my mind has tried to forget.
“I—” My voice fails me completely.
“We need to know who this is.” Ace’s voice is deceptively calm. He crouches beside his brother. “If he hurt you, we’ll kill him. It’s that simple.”
The matter-of-fact way he says it, like offering to pick up groceries, sends a shiver through me.
Cyrus squeezes my knee. “I’m going to make you some tea. We’re not going anywhere, and neither are you. Not until we understand what this is.”
As he disappears into the kitchen, I draw my knees up to my chest. The message on my phone keeps flashing behind my eyelids.
I know what happened at the Henderson house. I know what Richard did to you.
The basement walls close in around me. The camera’s red light blinks in the corner. His footsteps on the stairs.
A sob tears from my throat—raw and ugly—the sound of something breaking that was never properly fixed. Years of careful compartmentalization shatter in an instant. I press my face into my knees, shoulders shaking uncontrollably.
Ace places a hand on my back, his touch uncharacteristically gentle. He doesn’t speak. Doesn’t push. Just stays, a silent anchor as I drown in memories.
Minutes pass before Cyrus returns with a steaming mug. He sits on my other side, the couch dipping under his weight. “Here,” he murmurs, placing the tea on the coffee table. “When you’re ready.”
Their bodies create a protective barrier on either side of me. These men who kill without remorse, who claimed me so brutally during the Hunt, now handle me like I’m made of glass.
“Richard Henderson,” I finally whisper, the name burning my tongue like poison. “My third foster home.”
Cyrus takes my hand, his calloused thumb tracing circles over my knuckles.
“I was thirteen.” My voice sounds distant, detached. “He and his wife, Margaret, seemed perfect at first. Nice house. Regular meals. A bedroom with an actual door.”
“The first month was... fine. Better than anywhere else I’d been.” I stare at my hands, unable to meet their eyes. “Then Margaret went on a business trip. And Richard came to my room that night.”
Cyrus’s grip tightens on my hand. I feel Ace go perfectly still beside me.
“He said I needed to earn my keep. That the state didn’t pay enough for—” My throat closes around the words. “He took me to the basement. There was a camera.”
The silence that follows feels like glass about to shatter.
“I was there for six months before they moved me. One time I tried to run away, and Richard broke my ankle to ensure I couldn’t run. I never told anyone. Not the social worker, not the next family. No one.” I finally look up. “No records exist. No reports. Nothing. So how does this person know?”
Ace takes my phone, studying the message again. His face is a controlled mask, but his eyes burn cold. “We’ll find out.”
“We’ll find them,” Cyrus corrects, his voice unnervingly soft. “And then Richard Henderson.”
“He’s probably dead by now,” I whisper.
“For his sake, he better be,” Cyrus says.
Ace stands, already pulling out his own phone. “I’m calling Felix. We need to trace this account.”
As he steps away to make the call, Cyrus pulls me against his chest. I can feel his heartbeat, steady but fast, the rhythm of contained violence.
“No one will ever hurt you again,” he murmurs into my hair. “Not while we’re alive.”
For the first time since seeing that message, I believe I might actually be safe.
I clear my throat, the sound unnaturally loud in the sudden silence. My hands twist together in my lap, knuckles white.
“There’s more, isn’t there?” Cyrus asks, his voice gentle but knowing.
I nod, unable to meet his eyes. “When I was fifteen...” My voice catches. I swallow hard and try again. “My fifth foster home. The Pattersons. They seemed decent enough. Busy with their own lives, but not cruel.”
Cyrus waits patiently, his hand still covering mine.
“They used to leave me with his father when they went out of town. William Patterson. He was over seventy.” The words taste like ash in my mouth. “A drunk. Always reeking of whiskey.”
My vision blurs as tears fill my eyes. “He would come into the guest room at night. I—” Bile rises in my throat. “I can still smell him. The alcohol. His aftershave.”
A sob escapes me, harsh and raw. “And he—” I can’t finish. My body convulses with disgust, with the memory of his withered hands on my teenage body.
Cyrus pulls me against his chest, one hand cradling the back of my head. I feel his heartbeat accelerate, though his voice remains unnervingly calm.
“What was his name again?” he asks softly, his lips against my hair.
“William Patterson,” I whisper against his shirt. “But everyone called him Bill.”
Cyrus’s arms tighten around me, protective and possessive all at once. When he speaks, his voice is velvet-wrapped steel.
“I promise you, baby, any man who ever thought laying a hand on you was a good idea will die painfully and slowly.” He tilts my chin up, making me meet his eyes. “Ace and I will make sure of it.”
In those hazel depths, I see something that should terrify me—a promise of violence so calculated and cold it doesn’t even register as anger. But instead, I feel a twisted sense of safety wash over me.