Chapter 12
Seraphina
Iscream into my pillow until my throat feels like I’ve swallowed glass, but it doesn’t fucking help. Nothing helps. I can still taste Lucien’s blood on my lips, still feel the hard press of his body against mine, still smell his cologne clinging to my skin. I want to burn it all off.
Punching the pillow, I imagine it’s Lucien’s stupidly perfect face.
“Fucking asshole!” I shriek into the cotton, my voice breaking. “Conceited, controlling, psychotic BASTARD!”
I flip onto my back and stare at the ceiling, chest heaving.
The closet door is still open, those goddamn uniforms hanging there like a row of red-accented middle fingers.
And those jerseys—those fucking jerseys with his name on them.
Like I’m his property. Like I’m his little cheerleader girlfriend instead of his goddamn sister.
Half-sister. Whatever. It still makes this whole thing sick and wrong, and illegal.
The worst part—the absolute worst fucking part—is that I wanted him. When he pinned me against that wall, when his mouth was on mine, my body betrayed me completely. My nipples hardened, my pussy actually clenched, and for one humiliating second, I kissed him back.
“What the fuck is wrong with me?” I whisper to the empty room, pressing the heels of my hands against my eyes until I see stars.
I roll over and grab my phone, checking the time. The basketball game starts in four hours. Plenty of time to shower, change, and be literally anywhere else on campus except the gym. Fuck his threats. Fuck his jersey. Fuck him.
My phone buzzes with a text, and I almost throw it across the room when I see his name.
Unknown
Changed my mind. Wear the dress. I want to see those legs as I get my first triple double of the season.
“Fuck you,” I mutter, typing exactly that and hitting send. And fuck your triple double whatever the hell that even is.
I can’t help myself and I look it up. Blah blah blah basketball. When a player gets double digits in three out of five statistical categories in a single game. Okay, well, I hope you choke and don’t even get a single double digit then. Lucifer doesn’t deserve any accolades.
That can be arranged after the game. Just call me the number one sister fucker. I aim to please my family.
He’s so fucking disgusting. The ire I feel for him could fuel this entire dorm building at this point.
I go to turn off my phone when a call comes in from my mother. I silence it immediately, but the damn thing keeps buzzing, buzzing, buzzing. I finally throw it across the room with a frustrated scream.
“God, what the fuck does the bitch want now?!”
Suddenly, my door opens and there’s my mother, standing in the doorway with one perfectly sculpted eyebrow raised, looking like she just stepped off a magazine cover in her Chanel suit and pearls.
“To tell you I’m here,” she says coolly, her gaze sweeping over my disheveled appearance with obvious disapproval. “Charming greeting, darling. As eloquent as ever.”
I freeze, mortified and pissed off in equal measure. “How did you get into my building?”
“Please.” She rolls her eyes and walks inside uninvited, closing the door behind her. “As if a student dormitory could keep me out. The security guard was quite accommodating when I explained I was your mother.”
“What do you want?” I demand, not bothering to get up from my bed. Let her see me like this—unwashed, angry, and completely uninterested in playing her games.
Her eyes drift to the pile of discarded uniforms on my floor, then to the new ones hanging in my closet with their telltale red accents.
“I see Devereux is already doing his thing,” my mother sighs, running her manicured fingers over one of the red-accented uniforms.
“Yeah, and what the fuck am I supposed to do?” I snap, sitting up straight on the bed. “You caused this mess.”
She whirls around, her perfect bob swinging with the movement. “Oh no, don’t blame this on me. I told you not to go to that summons. I told you to pack and go hide. You chose this.”
I laugh, the sound harsh even to my own ears. “Maybe if you hadn’t fucked Vincent Devereux this wouldn’t be an actual problem. That’s what I meant, Mother. Don’t lay any blame on me. I didn’t ask for any of this, especially not to be born from your affair.”
Her nostrils flare slightly—the only crack in her perfect composure. “Well, you’re an adult now, Seraphina. Take some accountability.”
“Accountability for what?” I push off the bed, stalking toward her. “You won’t even take accountability for your shit and you want to preach to me. Please get off your high horse. I literally don’t know why Dad stays with you after all of this.”
My mother’s eye twitches, a micro-expression that speaks volumes. The realization hits me like a freight train, sucking the air from my lungs.
“Dad doesn’t know, does he?” I whisper, watching her face carefully. “He has no fucking idea I’m not his.”
Her silence is all the confirmation I need. Twenty-one years of lies suddenly make perfect sense—the way she shields me from him, the way she’s always been so controlling about our interactions.
“Oh, that’s even better,” I laugh bitterly, the sound scraping my throat raw. “Now I’m an adult when you take every opportunity to remind me I’m a child, and the whole time you’ve been lying to your husband for twenty-one years. Outstanding job, Mariella.”
“Don’t you dare judge me,” she hisses, stepping closer with venom in her eyes. “You have no idea what sacrifices I’ve made—“
“Sacrifices?” I cut her off, incredulous. “You fucked another woman’s husband and then lied to your own for two decades! Those aren’t sacrifices, those are consequences of your own shitty choices!”
“Watch your mouth,” she snaps, her perfectly manicured finger jabbing toward my face. “Everything I did, I did for this family.”
“Bullshit,” I snarl. “You did it for yourself. And now I’m the one paying for it.”
Her face hardens into that cold mask I know so well. “What’s done is done. You need to accept your situation and make the best of it.”
“Make the best of it?” I echo, my voice rising dangerously. “In case you haven’t noticed, my brother just chose me and nothing was fucking done. Vincent was there, he saw it all and did nothing to stop it.”
“Half-brother,” she corrects primly, like that makes it all better. “And Vincent has already informed me that he is handling this situation discreetly.”
I snort because yeah, I don’t believe that. They don’t call Lucien, Lucifer or The Devil behind his back and to his face for nothing. He does not give one single shit about what his father says. He operates only by the Society and not even Vincent Devereux can go against that.
“I’m done with discretion,” I say, a calm certainty settling over me. “I’m telling Dad everything. About Vincent, about the affair, about me. He deserves to know.”
Her face drains of color so fast I think she might faint. “You will do no such thing.”
“Watch me.” I grab my phone from where it landed on the floor. “I’ll call him right now.”
She lunges for the phone, but I dodge her grasp. “Seraphina Elise, I forbid you!”
“I’m not a child, remember?” I taunt, dangling the phone just out of her reach. “You can’t forbid me to do shit.”
“If you tell him, you’ll destroy this family,” she says, her voice shaking. “Is that what you want? Think of your brother.”
“My brother?” I laugh in her face. “Which one? The one who won’t take to us anymore, or the one who’s now MARKED me like I’m his property?”
Something flickers across my mother’s face. But it’s gone in an instant, replaced by that cool, controlled mask.
“You know nothing about your brother or what he’s been through,” she says, voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. “You think you’re the only victim here? Aurelio almost died because of—“
“Don’t you dare bring Aurelio into this!” I scream, advancing on her until she backs into my desk. “What happened to him is your fault. I can’t prove it but I just fucking know it. Look at what you’ve done to me just to cover your own lies. What other skeletons are hiding in your closet, Mother?”
Her face goes white as paper, and for a second I think I’ve actually struck a nerve deep enough to pierce her armor. But then her mask slips back on, smooth and perfect.
“You ungrateful little bitch,” she hisses, her composure cracking just enough to let the venom seep through. “After everything I’ve done to protect you—“
“Protect me?” I’m so angry I can barely see straight. “Is that what you call all this? Mother, I would have been better off left behind when you came back here or an orphan.”
She slaps me hard across the face, the crack of her palm against my cheek echoing in the small room. I stagger back, more from shock than pain. My mother has never hit me before.
“Enough,” she says, her voice deadly quiet. “You will not tell your father. You will attend the game tonight as I no doubt Lucien expects you to. You will play your role. And I will find a way to fix it. But until then, you will do as you’re told.”
I touch my stinging cheek, a strange calm washing over me. “Get out.”
“Seraphina—“
“GET THE FUCK OUT!” I scream, pointing at the door.
“Before I call Lucien and tell him how you assaulted me. How would that look for the perfect Mariella Carvelli, hmm? Do we think The Heir will take too kindly that someone regardless of who they are laid hands on his Chosen? Do we think he’ll cut the hand off that touched me?
I think he might. The Devil is owed his due and all. ”
She stares at me, and for a moment I see something like fear in her eyes. Then she straightens her jacket, adjusts her pearls, and walks to the door with that regal posture that makes me want to break something.
“This isn’t over,” she says, hand on the doorknob.
“It never fucking is with you,” I reply coldly.
After she’s gone, I sink to the floor, my legs suddenly unable to support me. My cheek throbs, but it’s nothing compared to the ache in my chest. I’ve never talked to my mother like that before. Never stood up to her so completely.
I refuse to be held down by the weight of being the perfect daughter. Of appeasing my mother even when I toe the line.
It stops today, now and forever.