Chapter 22 #3
Above all else, though, they raised us with love. That love was hard to understand for me but it saved me from spiraling into madness and becoming a blood-hungry demon ready to take out his frustration on anyone as long as it fed into my sadistic desires. “Don’t worry about it. I have my ways.”
A clicking of heels echoes, followed by someone slamming into me from behind, and Aileen’s familiar scent envelops me as she wraps her arms around my waist and presses her cheek to my shoulder.
“He’s trying to imply he’s their favorite,” she grumbles, and steals a cookie from the tray Theodor is holding.
It must be afternoon teatime before the family dinner tonight.
“Imply? It’s a fact,” I tease her as we both know our parents don’t have favorites, and chuckle when she pinches me hard. “Don’t be jealous. It’s a sin.”
“I think the ship of me being a saint has sailed. And I’m not jealous!”
“Theodore, please bring the mirror. Someone is turning green.”
Among us all, Aileen has the biggest competitive streak, so it became a habit of mine to ruffle her feathers.
Helped her and her genius brain to loosen up too.
“By someone, do you mean you? I’m the firstborn, remember? That gives me a certain privilege over you, younger brother.”
“I’m older than you, princess.”
“Still doesn’t change my title,” she replies smugly, and snatches one more cookie that she polishes in record time. She’s addicted to those.
Back when she was still pursuing ballet professionally and before her injury that put a stop to her dream, I used to sneak cookies into rehearsals and give them to her so no one would know.
I’d do anything for my sister. All she has to do is ask.
“Theodore, where is the mirror?” She kicks me from behind, and I laugh. “Quick. Bring the chocolate. This will push the green monster back.”
The butler rolls his eyes at us, and then says sternly, “You two get yourself together and greet your parents properly instead of acting foolish. I’m going to bring them tea.
They are in the living room.” With this, he dashes off, leaving us standing alone in the hallway, and Aileen moves around so she can stand in front of me.
She’s wearing a blue dress that matches her eyes, and I sigh dramatically. “Where is your beast, beauty?”
She’s so easy to tease and still blushes despite that fucker touching and claiming her left and right.
The reminder sours my mood.
My relationship with Rush is complicated. I helped them out back in the day because my sister loved him. I still held a grudge against that man for wanting to destroy my family, and at first, claiming Lavender as mine would have brought me satisfaction, letting me hurt him.
So he’d know how it feels when you lose your sister to a psychopath and can’t do anything about it.
But I guess it just makes us even now.
A sister for a sister, although my woman could never be fucking anything but mine.
At the thought of Lavender, possessiveness washes over me, and I resist the urge to check my phone to watch her on the cameras as she enjoys her reunion.
I can be reasonable if it makes her happy, but only on my terms.
She’s my most precious possession, and she must be protected at all costs.
“Must you always call him that? My fiancé has a name.” She pokes me in the stomach. “If you weren’t the one to insist that I forgive him, I’d think you didn’t like him or something.”
“Trust me, princess. No brother in the world truly likes his sister’s man, no matter how good he is.”
Because there is always a small possibility that the man can hurt her, and that thought is just unacceptable.
Brothers, true brothers, are protectors to their core, and as such, we should always keep our guards up.
Even if our sisters marry the men of their dreams.
“You sound so much like Rush that I can’t even take offense in that. He knows Lavender has someone. I told him to let her live a little and have her secrets. She deserves that.”
Ah, my naive Aileen.
Rush and Rafael did everything in their power to spy on my woman and find out who she’s dating. I managed to dodge all their attempts, though, and give them countless red herrings.
And thanks to that whole wedding thing, it wasn’t even strange that we spent so much time together, and Wyatt helped as well.
The thing about Kings?
They are your most loyal allies as long as they consider you a friend or family.
And your worst nightmare if you’re their enemy.
“I’m so happy you worked out your differences.
I was worried for a while that you two wouldn’t get along.
I wish she would trust us more, but I think we’ll get there in time.
We’re family after all.” She puts her handbag on the table and adjusts the pins in her hair.
“Emmaline and I always have to remind ourselves that they are all traumatized and still don’t know how to handle love. So we should proceed with caution.”
Moy cvetochek was surrounded by love her whole life. She just never had the chance to discover it, and now it’s my job to make sure she thrives in it.
“She’s stronger than you think.”
“Anyway, baby steps and all that. And by the way, Rush will join us later with Rafael, Emmaline, and Wyatt. Our parents invited them too. Uncle Zachary and Aunt Phoenix are traveling this weekend.”
Somehow, all the couples being there annoys me. Lavender still prefers for us to keep our relationship hidden.
I indulge her illusion of some control when it comes to her life, but not being able to claim my woman out in public is starting to piss me off. Her wearing my bracelet is not enough.
Everyone needs to know that my beautiful woman is mine.
“Rush allowed you to go without him?” I take her jacket from her and throw it on the banister on the way to the living room. “Shocking.”
She lifts her chin, and hisses, “Excuse me? Allow me? I make my own decisions.”
“Of course,” I agree, and she smiles only to slap me on the shoulder when I add, “under his watchful eye.”
“You take that back, Levi Scott!”
“I’ll take that back, and you can stop pretending that you aren’t into his stalker-like obsession with you.” I tap her nose. “You’re blushing.”
“No, I’m not!”
“Denial doesn’t look good on you, princess.”
“I can’t wait till you fall in love. You’ll be worse than Rush.”
I still at the word love.
While I grew up surrounded by it…I don’t really understand it on a deeper level.
Is my possessiveness, obsession, and need to own and protect considered love? Or rather, an unhealthy desire to possess the object of my fascination?
Every psychologist out there would call me a psychopath or put any other label on me for the crimes I commit.
My father and Rush aren’t very different, though, and they use the word love in their vocabulary. And while I’ll do anything for my woman…is it love?
We never spoke the word between us, and a strange need within me awakens, craving to hear her say it to me, even if I don’t believe in words.
They mean nothing; only actions matter.
Why is it so important to hear them now, then?
“Probably. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be a Scott, right?”
Her face softens, her blue eyes filling with warmth that’s so Aileen.
She surrounded me with it the minute our gazes met in that hospital room, and everything inside me calmed when she was near.
“That’s so sweet, Levi.” She hugs me tight, and I rock her in my arms, another thing I usually do just to make her and Mom happy. Hugs and embraces usually aren’t my thing either. They require a special connection that my aloofness wouldn't allow.
Hilarious, really, since my arms are the place I like Lavender most.
She’s my exception to every rule, creating cracks in my darkness brick by brick and letting the light in that’s blinding and intense in its nature.
“I know I’m getting married soon, and I’ve been preoccupied with other things, but I love you, baby brother. I hope you never forget that.”
Leaning back, I palm her cheeks, and ask, “Where is this coming from?”
“I don’t know. I guess I’m overly emotional lately with all the wedding stuff.” My brow rises. “The Wrights are so broken inside, it made me really grateful for growing up in our family. My heart hurts for them all.”
“Hearts can heal.”
Rush, Rafael, and Lavender aren’t alone anymore.
“That’s true.” She rises to her tiptoes and kisses me on the cheek. “Let’s go before they summon us for real.”
We share a quiet laugh, and in moments like this I wonder about my baby sister, who has lived in my mind for the past fourteen years.
No matter what I did, I could never find Robert and my sister.
I couldn’t even remember the property properly to search for it, and this kills me.
To think that I have a baby sister who grew up with a monster—a perverted monster.
So there is always a sense of guilt attached to my connection with Aileen.
I’ll find her, though, if it’s the last thing I do. He won’t be able to resist the need to hurt me because that’s how fuckers like him operate.
They search for a weakness and aim there, never being able to face anyone themselves.
I forcefully push the thoughts about Robert and my baby sister away, grounding myself in the present and schooling my features, never wanting to show my parents the true emotions fueling my blood.
The idea of disappointing them doesn’t sit well with me.
Dad would have probably understood, but Mom…she deserves more than having a serial killer for a son. She’d question my entire childhood and wonder if she could have done something different when the answer is simple.
There was nothing she could have done to prevent it because revenge was carved into my blood when my biological mom died.
We enter the living room and see them right away, sitting on the couch. Mom flipping through a magazine, her legs thrown over Dad's while he plays with her hair, watching her with an intensity that always made us avert our gazes.