28. Lilian
Lilian
I slowly return to consciousness. There’s a dull throb of pain between my thighs and in my lower back. I can feel it across my shoulders where someone’s teeth marked my skin.
Then, sensation. Soft sheets against naked skin, the weight of a blanket, the press of a mattress beneath me.
Finally, memory. Violent and fragmented, like glass shards slicing as I try to piece them together.
Aries. Arson. The flood. The chemical mist. Their hands on me. Inside me. Taking, claiming, using.
I should feel violated. Should feel broken. Should feel ashamed. I feel none of those things. The realization is startling enough to make me open my eyes, blinking against the soft light of a bedside lamp. I’m no longer in the basement. I’m in Arson’s bed. The night comes back to me in flashes—the shower, his unexpected gentleness, the way he filled me so differently than Aries had. Not taking. Not claiming. Something else entirely.
I shift slightly, cataloging the damage. There’s a tenderness between my legs that’s bearable but persistent. Finger-shaped bruises on my hips where I was held too hard. A tender spot on my shoulder where teeth broke skin. Not just one set. Both. Matching marks from identical mouths.
The physical evidence of what happened should horrify me. It should make me curl into myself with shame at the trauma of being caught between twin brutalities. Instead, I feel strangely...powerful. I survived them both. Took everything they had to give—the violence and the tenderness—and I’m still here. Still myself.
Is this what it means to be truly seen? Not as the fragile Hayes daughter, the girl with the heart condition, the precious invalid to be protected and controlled. But as a woman capable of withstanding darkness, of containing multitudes.
I examine a bruise on my wrist, pressing it lightly to feel the ache. Proof that it happened. Proof that I’ve been marked by both twins in ways that can never be undone. Their violence. Their desire. Their impossible complexities.
The shame doesn’t come, no matter how I search for it. Perhaps it will find me later, when the strange empowerment fades. For now, there’s only this peculiar strength—the knowledge that I’ve been broken open and somehow emerged more whole than before.
I am not what the Hayes family made me. Not what Aries imagined. Not even what Arson thought he was using. I am something else entirely. Something born in flood waters and fucking. Something that survived twin hungers and emerged changed but undiminished.
I look away and find Arson standing near the dresser, his back to me as he arranges something with methodical precision. Medical supplies, I realize. Bandages, antiseptics, and painkillers neatly lined up on the wooden surface. The care these preparations imply contrasts sharply with the careful distance he maintains.
He senses my wakefulness without turning. “There’s water beside you. Painkillers if you need them.”
Gone is the tenderness from last night. There’s none of the raw connection we forged in the shower and beneath the sheets. He’s clinical now. Detached. As if building walls between us with each passing second.
“Thank you,” I say, voice raspy.
He nods once but doesn’t turn to look at me.
His shoulders are tense beneath his T-shirt, the fabric stretched across muscles rigid with whatever emotion he’s working hard to contain. The distance isn’t accidental. It’s deliberate. Protective, though whether he’s protecting me or himself remains unclear.
I sit up slowly, wincing as new pains become noticeable. The sheet falls to my waist, exposing breasts marked with light bruises—evidence of mouths, hands, desires barely controlled. Arson’s gaze flicks to me in the dresser mirror, then away quickly. There is no missing the way his jaw tightens.
“You can use the shower,” he says, voice flat. “I left clean clothes on the counter.”
“Arson.” The sound of his name stops his movements. “Look at me.”
He turns reluctantly, eyes carefully fixed on a point above my head rather than meeting my gaze. The avoidance feels worse than anything that happened yesterday. I can practically feel him building the wall between us right now. I know he feels something, and everything on his face right now says he’d rather rip out his own heart than acknowledge it.
“We had a deal,” I say carefully, pulling the sheet up to cover myself since my nakedness seems to disturb him now. “My body for Aries’s freedom.”
A muscle jumps in his jaw. “Is that what you think happened yesterday? A transaction?”
“Isn’t it?” I challenge. “You made the terms clear. I agreed to them.”
“And you think you’ve paid your debt?” Finally, his eyes meet mine, something dangerous flickering in their depths. “You think what happened yesterday was you fulfilling your part of some bargain?”
The bitterness in his tone catches me off guard. “I gave you what you wanted,” I say, confusion bleeding into my voice. “I let you?—”
“You let me?” He interrupts, a harsh laugh escaping him. He seems pissed off, and I’m confused by that. Isn’t this what he wanted? “You didn’t let me do anything. You didn’t let either of us do anything.”
He steps closer, and it’s then that I see the fresh bruises on his face, my gaze drifting to the cut above his eyebrow. His proximity reminds me of how safe and secure I felt with his body pressed against mine, his cock deep inside me.
“There was no giving, Lilian,” he continues, voice dropping lower. “Only taking. First him, then me.”
That’s a low blow, even for him. “I made a choice,” I insist, though uncertainty creeps in. I wanted both of them, but I’m not sure I would’ve wanted it to be in the way it happened. “I agreed to your terms.”
“Did you?” His hazel eyes burned into mine. “Or did the adrenaline and drugs make the choice for you?”
“The chemicals lowered my inhibitions,” I argue, gripping the sheet tighter. “But they didn’t create desires that weren’t already there. No matter what you think, I wanted it.”
He laughs, the sound so cold it feels foreign coming from the same lips that left trails of fire on my body. “Is that what you tell yourself to lessen the trauma? That you wanted to be taken on a concrete floor while you were drugged?”
The crude description makes me flinch, but I hold his gaze. “How it happened no longer matters. I wanted it. Wanted both of you. I have for longer than I’d care to admit.”
The way his jaw tightens, his fists clenched tight at his sides…he’s acting like he gives a shit, like he cares about my well-being. Either that, or he’s pissed that I’m making him follow through with his part of the deal.
“Even after…” His voice tightens, turning brittle with restraint.
“Even after what?”
His upper lip curls into a sneer. “It doesn’t matter. So now you assume the agreement is done? That spreading your legs means Aries goes free?”
“You said?—”
“I know what I said.” He cuts me off and begins to pace the small space in front of me. “I also know what actually happened. I didn’t take anything from you that you didn’t beg for in that shower. It was Aries who took from you without asking.”
Confusion tangles my thoughts. Yes, Aries had been rough, desperate even, but he didn’t take anything from me that I hadn’t given him. They both wanted to use me to hurt each other.
“You’re just as much at fault as he is.”
A twisted smile appears on his lips, sending a rush of cold dread slithering down my spine. “Catching up, finally? Realizing that I’m the monster I told you I was all along?”
“Nothing you do will ever make me believe you’re a monster. You’re hurt, you want retribution, you want to make them feel the same pain you felt. I understand that. I want to help you. That’s why I’m here, but we had a deal. I gave you what you wanted.”
He rolls his eyes. “The virgin sacrifice balances the scales?”
Something in his tone sets alarm bells ringing. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying”—he moves closer, eyes never leaving mine—“that Aries got far more out of this bargain than I did.”
I recoil slightly, mind racing to decode his meaning. “I don’t understand.”
“He didn’t just take your virginity, Lilian.” Arson’s voice drops lower, an edge of pain beneath the anger. “He took what he wanted and left you unconscious on the wet floor. Used you as a distraction to escape. Would have been halfway to freedom if I hadn’t stopped him.”
The revelation hits hard, pieces clicking into place. The soreness. The abandonment. The way Arson had been the one to carry me to safety, to clean me up, and care for me afterward.
“You’re lying,” I whisper, but doubt has already started to take root. “He wouldn’t just leave me there.”
“Wouldn’t he?” Arson laughs humorlessly. “I know it’s hard to believe that your precious Aries…the one you’ve been pining after for years, the same one who kept you at arm’s length… would do such a terrible thing, that he would use you as a weapon against me when the occasion came.”
Unwelcome tears prick at my eyes. “Stop it.”
“You want to know who Aries is, how much you matter to him?” he continues relentlessly. “Here it is: he fucked you, got what he wanted, and walked away without a backward glance. He left you bleeding and unconscious on the cold concrete. There’s not a doubt in my mind that he would have let you die there if it meant gaining his freedom.”
Each word chips away at something fundamental inside me—the years of fantasy built around Aries, the noble stepbrother who kept his distance to protect me. Strong, dependent, fierce in loyalty. The reality Arson presents is too painful to accept, yet too specific to dismiss.
“I don’t believe you,” I whisper, though I can hear the uncertainty in my voice.
“I don’t need you to believe me. I know what I saw. Or did you forget that it was me who gave you a shower? Who fed you? Who tended to your wounds? Who held you in their fucking arms?” I hate what he’s telling me. Hate that it leads me to doubt Aries and his intentions. That it makes me believe I might not know him at all.
“Why are you doing this?” I demand, pushing aside the sheets to stand despite my nakedness, despite the pain that shoots through various parts of my body. “You’re not innocent, either. You used me to hurt him, to torture him. And you still fucked me, even after he claimed me. If you want me to believe he is a monster, then I would have to believe you are, too, and that’s not possible.”
His gaze skims over every mark, lingering just long enough to make my skin burn, before he meets my eyes with a quiet, unreadable stillness. “It is possible. You just don’t want to acknowledge it. The proof is in every bruise, the tenderness between your thighs, the bite marks on your shoulder.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“What do you want me to say?” His voice cracks with its weight. “That watching him touch you made my vision blur with rage? That seeing him inside you felt like betrayal carved into my skin? That I wanted blood before, but now I want war? That finding your limp body on that floor made me want to rip him apart, piece by piece, until he begged for the end?”
I’m caught off guard by his response. This isn’t the calculated manipulation I’ve come to expect from him. This is something else—something dangerously close to genuine feeling.
“I want the truth,” I insist, stepping closer despite my vulnerability. “Not whatever twisted version serves your revenge fantasy.”
The air is so tense, crackling with unsaid emotion and rage. I’m waiting for the moment he snaps, but it never comes. Instead, he moves to the desk where his laptop sits closed. He makes quick work of opening it and typing in a few commands before he turns the screen to me.
“Don’t believe me?” he asks, voice flat. “Take a look for yourself.”
The security footage is grainy but clear enough. The time stamp shows yesterday’s events, during the flood. The camera angle captures the corridor outside Aries’s cell. I watch with growing horror as the events unfold on screen. Aries finishes inside me, then my body goes limp beneath him. He pulls out and pushes up off the floor. There’s no hesitation, no moment of concern or care for me. He simply stands, gathers his soaked pants, and walks away.
The camera follows his retreat down the corridor, and not once does he look back at my unconscious form. The clinical brutality of it, the casual disregard, makes my stomach clench.
“He didn’t even check to make sure you were still breathing,” Arson says quietly. “Didn’t try to move you out of the water. He just used you, fucked you, and discarded you like you meant nothing to him.”
A knife pierces my heart. I want to deny it, to claim the footage is manipulated, but the evidence is too raw and too real to be anything else. The time stamps continue, showing minutes passing with me lying there on the floor. Then Arson appears, regaining consciousness.
The rage on his face as he pushes himself up is unmistakable. Not calculated. Not performed for cameras, he might not have remembered were there. He wears a mask of pure, protective fury as he first checks me, then follows his brother.
“Please, stop,” I whisper, unable to watch more. “I’ve seen enough.”
He closes the laptop with a soft click that seems to echo in the silent room. I stand motionless, trying to process everything, trying to reconcile the Aries from my fantasies with the man who left me like discarded trash.
“I want to see him,” I finally speak, my voice steadier than I feel.
Arson’s head snaps up. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“I didn’t ask if it was a good idea.” I move toward the pile of clothes he left out for me. T-shirt and sweatpants. All his, all too big, but at least they’re clean and dry. I pull them on, my hands trembling. “I need to hear him say it.”
“What exactly do you think he’s going to say?” Arson questions warily. “That he’s sorry? That it was a mistake? That deep down he actually gives a fuck?”
I don’t bother confirming that those are, in fact, the things I hope he says, so I ignore them and focus on getting dressed. Once fully clothed, I turn to him.
“You can’t stop me,” I tell him, though we both know that’s not true.
He could lock me in this room if he wanted. Could restrain me as easily as he has Aries. I don’t doubt that he would do just that, but I’m too invested in understanding what happened to give a shit. With a sigh, he runs a hand through his hair in a gesture that is so reminiscent of his twin, it makes my chest ache.
“If that’s what you want, then fine. I’m coming with you, though.”
“I expected that.”
The walk to Aries’s cell is silent, tension building with each step. Every muscle screams in protest of the movement, my muscles sore and joints stiff from yesterday’s violence. I do my best to ignore the discomfort, focusing on the confrontation ahead.
Aries is awake when we reach the observation window. He sits on the edge of his cot, wrists and ankles bound by chains that allow limited movement and zero chance of escape.
The evidence of the fight with Arson is reflected on his face. A split lip, bruised cheek, and a cut above his eyebrow that probably needs stitches. No matter what, he’s still beautiful, still the man I dreamed of for so many years, even if it feels like I don’t know him right now.
“Well, isn’t this touching?” he greets us, his mocking voice carrying clearly through the intercom Arson activates. “The happy couple comes to visit.”
Everything inside me says this is wrong. This isn’t the man I longed for and lusted after for two years. I step closer to the glass, aware that Arson watches us carefully.
“Why?” The single word holds all my confusion, all my hurt.
Aries’s eyes—identical to Arson’s but somehow colder—meet mine with casual indifference. “What is it that you’re asking? Why did I fuck you? Because you were there. Because I knew it would hurt him.” He nods toward Arson. “Plus, you’ve been begging for my dick since you were sixteen. A man can only resist for so long.”
How could he… how could he talk like that? It hurts. It hurts so fucking bad. I press my palms against the glass, needing its solidity to keep myself upright.
“Stop trying to make me hate you. Stop with the games. Why did you leave me there?” My voice cracks as all my emotions threaten to break free. “Unconscious. Hurt.”
He merely shrugs, the chains rattling with the movement.
“I don’t recall you complaining when you came all over my cock. It’s not like I left you unsatisfied. You served your purpose, and I was done. I didn’t count on my brother showing such attachment to you, so in the end, you were the distraction I needed to get out of here.”
Cruelty seeps from his pores, its stench so heavy I can barely breathe. This isn’t the Aries I thought I knew. No, this is the man he was all along. The man hidden behind careful distance and polite rejection. This is the real him, the one without a mask.
“Oh, come on. What did you expect?” Aries asks, leaning forward as far as his chains allow. “I can see the disappointment on your face, Lil. What did you think would happen? That I would announce my love for you? That I would sweep you into my arms and care for you?”
I blink back tears, trying to hold my emotions in. A mockery of a smile appears on his lips, clear satisfaction at the pain riddling my features.
“You spent years tempting me, begging me to fuck you, and now that you got what you wanted, you aren’t happy?”
“That’s not it.”
“Then what is it? It’s not my fault you expected more. Your virginity didn’t mean shit to me. I don’t do gentle. I don’t do slow. I fuck, and that’s what you got. Fucked .”
I don’t know how much longer I can stand here and let him cut me with his words. I struggle to reconcile this man with the stepbrother who always seemed so careful, in control, and noble in his distance.
“I thought—” I begin, but he cuts me off with a harsh laugh.
“I know what you thought. That I kept my distance because I cared too much, right? That I didn’t fuck you earlier because I wanted to protect you?” He shakes his head, and his eyes, the same eyes I’ve dreamed about, pierce mine with a blistering cold that I feel in my bones. “I kept my distance because you were another obligation. My father’s new wife’s damaged daughter. Another Hayes family burden. And I didn’t want to be responsible for breaking you.”
Arson steps closer to the glass, tension radiating off him, and I know he wants to step in. He wants to stick up for me, but this is my confrontation, my illusions to lose.
“Then why?” I press harder, desperate for some explanation that might hurt less than this brutal dismissal. “Why did you warn me about him?” I gesture toward Arson. “Why tell me he was dangerous if you didn’t care about me?”
“Because he is dangerous.” Aries’s eyes shift to his brother, and some unreadable emotion flickers there. “This is nothing more than a game, so anything that hurts him is worth doing. Even playing protector to you for a moment.
Making him believe that you might put a wrench in his plans. It’s manipulation.”
My fingers curl against the glass, and I wish we were face-to-face. I wish I could hurt him the way he’s hurting me right now. “So that’s all I was? A weapon in your fight with each other?”
“I don’t understand. What else could you have been to me?” Aries asks, genuine confusion in his voice. “Look at yourself, Lilian. The fragile heart patient. The charity case. The girl who spreads her legs for twins in the span of an hour.”
I try not to let it bother me, but it hurts so much more than I expected.
“Stop. I know you don’t mean it.”
“I’m sorry, but it’s not my fault if you saw this for more than what it really was.”
“It was real. It is real.” I sniffle.
“You’re right. It is real. We fucked. What isn’t real is your expectation. I don’t want you, and I never have.” He’s lying. He has to be. I remember all the times I caught him watching me, the gentleness in his eyes, the consideration and care. “Though I will say, you were a decent fuck. Tight. Responsive. Better than I expected, considering.”
Shame finally finds me, hot and caustic, burning through the strange empowerment I felt upon waking. I step back from the glass and wrap my arms around my middle as if I can physically hold myself together that way. It feels like I’m being ripped apart at the seams.
“Thanks for the distraction,” Aries continues, watching my reaction with clinical interest. “And for warming up for my eventual escape. I’ll be sure to remember you fondly once I’m free.”
The words are a dismissal, casual and complete. Years of fantasy crumble in seconds—the noble stepbrother replaced by this cold, calculating stranger who sees me as nothing more than a convenient tool.
All that’s left to do is walk away. I turn, unable to look at him anymore, unable to bear the sight of a face I loved twisted with such casual cruelty. My legs feel unsteady, the world tilting on its axis as everything I thought I knew rearranges itself into painful new configurations.
Arson’s hand catches my elbow, steadying me, but I flinch away from his touch.
Too much. All of it, too much.
“Are you satisfied now?” he asks quietly. “Do you believe me or do you need him to continue?”
I shake my head, unable to form words through the tightness in my throat and burning behind my eyes. Every memory of Aries—every moment I treasured, every glance I interpreted as a hidden feeling—was now poisoned by the reality of his indifference. He never really cared. Never really wanted me.
“I’ve seen enough,” I manage, voice breaking despite my effort to control it. “I want to go back upstairs.”
Arson nods once, sharp and precise, but makes no move to touch me again. The careful distance he maintains feels like both kindness and punishment.
As I turn to leave, his voice stops me. “Go ahead. I’ll be up in a minute.”
Something in his tone—a dangerous undercurrent I’ve come to recognize—makes me hesitate. I glance back to see him step closer to the observation window, his posture shifting from the controlled presence beside me to something more predatory.
“Look at her,” Arson says to Aries, voice pitched to carry through the intercom. “Really look at what you’ve done.”
Aries rolls his eyes, chains clinking as he shifts on the cot. “Spare me the moral outrage. We both know you’re not any more innocent than me.”
“That’s just it. I never pretended to be.” Arson’s hand presses flat against the glass, a mirror image of how I stood moments ago. “And I never left her to die on a concrete floor.”
“She’s still breathing, isn’t she?” Aries shrugs. “Besides, you should thank me. I broke her in for you. Made it easier to play your little savior act.”
I should leave. Should walk away from this toxic exchange, from the way they continue to use me as a weapon against each other even now. But my feet remain rooted to the spot, watching the identical faces contort with twin hatreds.
“Broke her in for me?” Arson shakes his head in what looks like disappointment. “Do you even hear yourself right now?”
“Aw, are you mad your plan didn’t work out as you intended? Mad that I didn’t fall at her feet and apologize? What exactly is it that you’re upset about? Because from where I’m standing, it sounds like you’re developing feelings.”
“I’m going to kill you,” Arson says, voice suddenly calm, terrifyingly matter-of-fact. “Not today. Not quickly. But I promise you, before this is over, you will beg for death.”
The clinical certainty in Arson’s tone sends ice through my veins. This isn’t bluster or performance. This is a promise, plain and simple.
Aries’s smile is equally chilling. “Do your worst. I’ll be here whenever you’re ready. Just remember we both know which one of us was made to survive.”
I finally force myself to move, steps quickening as I flee down the corridor, their voices fading behind me. My mind reels, trying to process everything—Aries’s cruelty, Arson’s unexpected protectiveness, the violence simmering between them that seems destined to end only when one of them is dead.
I reach the stairs, leaning heavily against the wall as my legs threaten to give out. The truth settles over me like a shroud—there are no heroes in this story. No noble protectors. No redemption waiting in the wings.
Just two broken men, shaped by the same trauma into different monsters. And me, caught between them, no longer a pawn, perhaps, but still very much in danger of being consumed by their mutual destruction.
The strangest part isn’t Aries’s betrayal or Arson’s unexpected care. It’s the realization that despite everything—despite the manipulation, the violence, the using—I’m not running away. Not planning my escape. Because somewhere along the way, I’ve become as broken as they are. As unable to walk away from this darkness they’ve pulled me into.
As complicit in whatever happens next.