2. Mackenzie
Valentino’s voicedrifts down the corridor and into my room.
“Let me the fuck past, or I swear I won’t be responsible for what happens next.”
Kirill’s words follow. “You do not want to stand in our way.”
There’s a yell and a scuffle.
I sit up, fighting against the exhaustion that clings to me after such a serious seizure, and frown in the direction of the noise. It must be private security holding them back; it’s not as though they’ll have the police here. Whoever was trying to keep them out of my room must have decided it wasn’t worth the stress, as Kirill and Valentino both storm through the door.
They seem to fill the room, Kirill so blond, and Valentino so dark. Like a crazy yin and yang.
I huddle into myself, drawing my knees into my chest. I feel vulnerable around them. I look like shit, but it’s not even that bothering me. This has nothing to do with outward appearances. It’s to do with my soul. It’s like being around them peels back my skin and reveals my heart, raw and barely beating, to them.
“Fuck, Mack,” Kirill says, his words sharpened by both his accent and emotion. “Thank God you are okay.”
Tino’s gaze darkens. “You frightened the hell out of us.”
Mom looks between me and them and offers a tight smile. It’s clear she’s hoping that two gorgeous men will have more progress with making me feel better than she has.
“I’ll go and grab some coffee,” she offers. “Does anyone want anything?”
They both shake their heads, and she slips from the room.
“I don’t want you here,” I manage to whisper.
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Kirill’s blue eyes are icy.
At first, I don’t know what he means. “Tell you what?”
He gestures at the hospital bed. “That you are sick.”
I close my eyes briefly. “I’m not sick. I have a condition, that’s all.”
“You still should have told us.”
“Why? It’s none of your business.”
A muscle ticks in Tino’s jaw. “What the fuck are you talking about? Of course it’s our business. You’re our business.”
I huff air from my nose. “Since when?”
He perches on the edge of the bed. I hate how I’m so aware of his proximity. “Since you became ours.”
“I’m not yours. I’m not anyone’s.” I blink away tears. “I know it was you, Tino. I know you filmed my mom and then put it on the screen. Dom might be the one taking the fall, but you were the one behind it all.”
He rakes his hand through his thick, black hair. “I didn’t know.”
“Know what? That it would mean the end of us? Of course you did.” I turn to Kirill. “And you supported him. You wanted me gone as much as Dom did.”
He shakes his head. “No, I never wanted you gone. Neither did Tino. But Dom is like a brother to us.”
“And he wanted me to leave, so you did whatever it took to support him.” I give a small bark of cold laughter. “I guess, in another world, I’d see that kind of loyalty as a good thing.”
“He regrets it now,” Kirill offers. “Very much. He wishes he could change things.”
I bite the inside of my mouth. “Why? Because he found out I’m epileptic? Or because his father is pissed at him for ruining the wedding?”
Tino shakes his head. “Things might have been different if he’d known about the epilepsy.”
“Are you for real? Do you even know how stupid and ableist you sound? It’s not something that makes you treat a person decently. Your own morals should do that, but they failed. As for Dom, I don’t need his pity, or yours either, for that matter. I didn’t want people to know so they didn’t treat me any differently than anyone else, and the same is true for all of you, too. You did what you did to get rid of me. Well, congrats, you got what you wanted.”
“We never wanted to be rid of you,” Tino says. “We wanted you to stay.”
I snap at him. “But Dom wouldn’t allow it? Right? And the two of you are too weak to stand up to him.”
Kirill visibly flinches at that. “We are not weak. We supported him, that is all, but you still should have told us.”
My tone is laced with sarcasm. “So, what? So you could have been a bit nicer to me? Jeez, thanks. I’m so grateful. Take pity on the poor girl who starts at your school because she’s got a condition?”
Kirill presses his lips into a thin line. “We thought you could take it. We thought you were strong.”
I grit my teeth, though their very presence is draining me of what little energy I have. “I am fucking strong. I’m stronger than any of you assholes have any idea about. Just because things short-circuit for me on occasion doesn’t mean I’m a weak person. I’ve had to deal with the sort of shit you have no idea about.” I realize I’m about to say more than I should, and clamp my mouth shut.
How did my life end up this fucking complicated?
I don’t know where I’m supposed to go, or what I’m supposed to do. I’ve relied on my mom for her support my whole life, and now she’s ripped that rug out from under my feet. Maybe I should be more independent at my age, but it’s not as though I’ve had a normal life. I’m frightened of being alone, of what might happen if I have a seizure and there’s no one around to help me.
That used to be the thing I was most scared of.
Now the idea of going back to Verona Falls and having to live with my mother and Nataniele and Dom is even worse.
I guess I’ll give Dom what he wants—I’ll leave. I’m broke, and I have nowhere to go, and I have no idea how I’ll keep getting my meds, but my self-destruct mode has fully set in. I’d rather die alone than be anywhere near these assholes.
“Seeing you like that makes me want to hurt someone,” Tino says helplessly. “I want someone to pay for putting you in the hospital.” He bunches his fists, the muscles in his neck and shoulders tensing.
I stare at him in disbelief. “You were the ones who hurt me, Tino. You, and Dom, and Kirill.”
He ducks his head. “We didn’t mean to. Not like this. We just thought it would make your mom leave.”
“And take me with her.”
He has the good grace to glance away. “Well…yeah.”
I glare between them both. “So you wanted to get rid of me?”
Kirill lifts his hand in a stop sign. “No, we did not. It was not about you. It was about your mom marrying Nataniele.”
“And I just got caught up in the crossfire,” I say bitterly.
Tino takes my hand, and the feel of his skin on mine is enough to stop my heart. I can’t bear it. It hurts too much, and I snatch it away.
“We’re sorry, Kenzie. We can’t even say how sorry. We just want to make things better.”
“You can’t fix me. It doesn’t work that way. I have to live with my condition.”
Kirill presses his lips into a line. “What can we do to help?”
“Nothing. Stay the hell away from me. That’s what you can do to help.”
Tino shakes his head. “We can’t do that. You are ours now. We’re no more capable of leaving you alone than cutting off a limb.”
The crazy thing is, I believe him. It’s as though I’ve become an obsession to them, and not in a good way. They love me—they hate me. They want me to leave, but they can’t bear to lose me.
A person could be torn in two under such opposing forces.
“Dom still wants me gone, doesn’t he? He’s not going to appreciate it if you suddenly go all caring on me.”
Kirill straightens his spine. “Dom is not the boss of us.”
I arch my brow. “Could have fooled me.”
Tino edges farther onto the bed, one leg swinging. “Anyway, he regrets how things went down. Seeing you collapse like that. It made him realize some stuff. It made all of us realize some stuff.”
“Like what? Like you’re supposed to care about me? Fuck off, both of you. You’ve ruined my life. If you think I’m going to come crawling back to you just because you feel guilty that you were messing with a sick girl, you can think again. I never want to see any of you, or Verona Falls, again.”
Tino softens his tone. “Where are you going to go, Duchess?”
“I don’t know. I’ll figure it out. And don’t call me that.”
Kirill bites his lower lip and tilts his head as he regards me. “We are not going to just let you leave.”
I scoff laughter. “So, first you want to get rid of me, and then you’re going to force me to stay? Do you have any idea what you sound like?”
“Like Dom,” he admits.
I know I shouldn’t be worried about Dom. He deserves whatever is coming to him. But Nataniele is a dangerous man. A powerful man. Does he have it in him to hurt his own son? I want to tell myself that he doesn’t, but the world I’d lived in before now, where I thought I could depend on people’s morals, no longer exists. My stomach twists. I want to tell myself that I’d take pleasure in him being punished, but I can’t bring myself to believe that.
Would a father really hurt his son?
Would a wife have her husband murdered?
Would a young woman kill her lover?
I know at least two of these things to be true, so why not the third?