8. Chapter 8 #2
“No, you don’t get to come here, pretend like you want what’s best for us, and…accuse me of something like that.”
Cyrus watched as Gabe just stood there and stared at him for a moment before he finally turned around to walk out of the room.
He didn’t have his phone, and he hadn’t finished reading the papers or files, but who cared?
He was exhausted and sick of the night. It needed to be over.
He couldn’t handle one more second of it.
Especially not after having been accused of what he had.
He swallowed hard and climbed the stairs to his bedroom. As he was getting to the top, Gabe quickly followed after him and reached out to hand his phone over to him.
Cyrus snatched it from his grasp.
“I’m sorry,” Gabe told him.
“Fuck, let me go to bed,” Cyrus told him and then turned around and did exactly that.
In bed, however, he tossed and turned. He could only look at the darkness of the inside of his eyelids for so long before he was staring at the ceiling, and he could only look at the ceiling for so long before he was sitting up in bed and looking out of the window at the stairs and the way the trees moved with the heavy breeze.
He felt beyond disoriented.
Cyrus slowly made his way out of his bedroom to Lily’s room, hoping she’d be awake.
He knocked gently on the door, and after a couple of seconds, he heard a “Come in.”
Cyrus opened the door and peeked inside to see Lily curled up in bed with The Great British Baking Show paused on her laptop and her earbuds in her hand.
“Am I bothering you?” he asked.
She shook her head, looking tired and concerned.
“What’s up?” she asked. She knew Cyrus didn’t usually bug her in the middle of the night unless something serious was happening.
“Everything.” He sighed and closed the door behind him before walking over to sit on the edge of Lily’s bed as she had her laptop resting on her desk chair near her bed.
“Have you even slept the last few days?” she asked.
Cyrus sighed. “Sorta,” he replied and then scrubbed his hand over his face.
Lily sat up in bed and put her headphones down on her laptop keyboard. The screen’s light was the only thing that illuminated the room, casting a white-blue glow against them.
“Gabriel…Gabe,” he said slowly, and Lily looked ten times more interested than ever before. “I knew him. I didn’t remember fully, but I was hired as a guard for his family twelve years ago. I worked with them for two years before I—” He paused and shook his head. “Had to leave.”
Lily’s brow furrowed. “And he didn’t say any of this when he first got here?” she asked.
“No, we just got into it in the library. He is mad at me for leaving, and…I guess here as some…ugh,” Cyrus mumbled, “I don’t know but.”
Lily frowned.
“What happened? Did he tell you or…” she asked.
“He asked me why I left, I…admitted I remembered, though it mostly came back to me today,” Cyrus told her. “Then he…in the heat of the moment accused me of being a pedophile.”
Lily gasped. “What?!”
“I accused him of having a crush on me when he was a kid. That’s why he’s here, but…Lily, I would never do anything.” He swallowed hard. “Just the idea of being interested in a kid makes me sick.”
Lily scooted closer to him. “I know.” She sighed.
“Was this the family that you left after…Kasper?” she asked, not finishing her complete sentence.
Cyrus nodded.
“Damn, I’m sorry,” she said slowly. “There’s so much going on right now. New Alpha, the attacks Liam didn’t tell you about, and now you have even more drama with Gabe.”
Cyrus looked at the ceiling for a moment. “Yes, thank you for recapping,” he mumbled.
“I’m only saying that it’s a lot on your shoulders. You should get some sleep,” Lily told him. She leaned over to wrap her arms around him in a hug.
Cyrus wrapped one arm around her and squeezed her.
“I tried, trust me,” he mumbled.
She sighed. “Well, you can sit and watch this with me until you’re ready to sleep,” Lily offered.
He scooted back on the bed and leaned against the wall. Lily handed him one of her pillows, and he shifted to put it behind him.
He watched bread, cakes, cookies, and such be baked for the next hour. It wasn’t dull, but its calmness started to lull him to sleep. Near the end of the episode, Lily had to shove him playfully out of bed and insist he go back to his room.
Cyrus collapsed down in his bed, and it didn’t take very long before he fell asleep. The comfort Lily had brought him and the show made it easier to let the weight of the day melt off his shoulders.
He was waking up to the sun blaring in his face the next moment.
He groggily made his way downstairs, the scent of coffee in the air.
When he stepped into the kitchen, he saw Cassidy pouring a mug.
“You look beat,” she said as she leaned against the counter, drinking her coffee black.
“That’s unfortunate, as I got the most sleep in days,” Cyrus muttered. He stepped over to grab his mug from the cabinet and pour himself some coffee. He was adding some creamer and sugar and leaning against the counter himself.
“You and Gabe heard anything from Nina and Patrick again yet?” she asked.
Cyrus shook his head. “No, it doesn’t look like anyone else has been attacked or gone missing in the last few days, but…it’ll probably be soon.”
He took a deep breath.
“Any idea who it is?” she asked.
“Yeah, actually, a pretty good idea, but we can’t say anything until we know for sure.”
Cassidy nodded. “Well, good luck.” She lifted her mug at him and started out of the kitchen.
The next moment, Gabe’s face was in his view.
Cyrus’s stomach tightened, and he looked toward the other side of the room.
“I’m not here to bother you. I’m just getting some breakfast,” Gabe insisted.
Cyrus didn’t reply to him. Instead, he started out of the kitchen with his coffee. He heard Gabe sigh.
“What?” Cyrus asked, looking at Gabe. “You’re the one who started all this, so what are you sighing about?”
Gabe’s jaw flexed. “Nothing. Enjoy your coffee.”
Cyrus turned and continued out of the kitchen.
If there was anything he didn’t need, it was that.
He didn’t need the memories of the past sneaking upon him.
There was a lot in his past, and of all the things to come creeping upon him.
Gabe was the last thing he needed. There was nothing wrong with Gabe; there had never been, technically speaking, but that period of Cyrus’s life wasn’t one he wanted to remember.
Cyrus had lost too much.