Chapter 45
Viper
Heat kisses my face, laps at my arms. I stab at the fire in the hearth with the iron poker, driving it deep into the logs until they crack and split.
They flare wildly, almost as violent and hot as the anger simmering under my skin.
A fiery rage settled in my bones after our conversation with Father, and I can’t seem to rid myself of it.
Every muscle in my body coils tight, ready to snap.
I pace the study like a caged animal, waiting for him.
Striker checked on our girl after our talk with Father and said she was sleeping. As much as I want to wake her, see her face, I know she needs rest. She deserves peace after the hell she’s been through.
Fucking test.
Fallon is many things, a sociopath, a narcissistic bastard, but one thing he is not is a bald-faced liar. He may leave out details, lie by omission, but I believe him when he says he didn’t send his soldier to assault her.
That’s not how he works. Threaten to kill Striker? Absolutely. Actually do it?
My stomach twists. I like to think he wouldn’t, but he would send a soldier to test Delilah’s skills. To see if she can handle herself on her own.
But rape?
Not his style.
Threaten, yes. Demean, of course. Test, scare, and humiliate? That’s how he works. But he knows how protective we are of each other. And now, how protective we are of our girls.
They belong to us, and are one of us now.
If Father killed one of us, we’d burn everything to the ground.
Reaper filled us in on the nightmare of this past week. The brutal training, Fallon’s suffocating presence, the harsh weapons lesson Delilah learned. How he wraps threats around our throats like fucking collars.
We tried to negate the damage done to them. We thought if we were softer, showed them we cared in our fucked-up way, we could lessen the harm done to them. As if our pathetic attempts at kindness could erase the damage we caused.
Fucking fools we are. You can’t plan something like this and not destroy the very tool you’re using. Delilah will never be the same after this. If she lives. If we all live.
When they learn the truth? They’ll see exactly what we are, and we’ll lose them forever.
They may even lose each other.
My heart aches at the thought.
We’re selfish bastards. Arrogant, and cruel too. We willingly went along with Reaper and snatched Cora up, dragging her into this mess simply because we wanted her. We thought we could use them and then discard them when we were done, uncaring of the aftermath.
Even after four years of consuming nothing but information on them, secretly longing to touch them, we still refused to acknowledge the soul-deep ache we felt to own them, and prioritized the mission.
But now they are ours.
And we protect what’s ours.
“What do you need, my son?” Father’s voice snaps me back into the room.
Not turning to look at him, I replace the poker in the stand, and rest my hand on the mantle, staring down at the flames as he approaches.
He stops next to me, and I feel his eyes moving over the side of my face.
Part of me expects a lecture on how I broke an order, left telling no one, but he’s already made his point by brutalizing Delilah and threatening Striker.
We defy him; he hurts one of us. That is how Fallon has always worked. Harsh punishments ensure no repeat behavior. Yet we still follow him, still want his approval, still crave the sprinkling of affection he hands out now and then, when we least expect it.
Like when a seven-year-old boy needs vengeance.
That’s the only thing that helped me survive him. Survive the lashings, solitary, the cruel room to break us down as young boys that left scars etched into Striker’s skin. How he beat our loyalty into us, only ever giving a fraction of it in return.
But knowing that Delilah endured the same fear, that she was so scared she stabbed a man, replays in my head over and over. All because Fallon didn’t see what lived inside 57.
Just like he had been fucking blind to what was happening right under his roof all those years ago.
“Did you know?” I say, not looking at him.
His sigh scrapes against my nerves. “Clarify, son, my patience is thin.”
“Cook.”
I sense him tense, sense his entire demeanor shift, becoming colder.
“No.” One syllable. Clinical. Dismissive. Like my question doesn’t warrant his time or energy.
Or a fucking explanation.
“How?” The word rips from my throat as I face him. “How the fuck did you not know?”
Father’s shoulders tense. I wonder if he’s remembering the day he found Cook mutilated. The day he realized what kind of monster he’d let live under his roof.
“You never told me,” he says, but the icy edge has disappeared from his tone.
My chest constricts so tightly I can barely breathe. I didn’t tell him because I couldn’t. I was just a scared boy whose only father he’d ever known, constantly doubted him. Told him he was full of sin, just like Headmistress Isla.
I press my fingers to my temple, rubbing at the throbbing ache.
“You were constantly questioning me. Lecturing me. Reminding me how disappointing I was for looking at men.” My hand grips the mantle, the urge to shake him nearly owning me.
“You saw something there, something wrong, yet you blamed me. You never questioned Cook. You questioned me—the damaged boy who had already been perverted.”
“I trusted him,” Father snaps. “The man had no record, no prior history, and he took an interest in all of you. Your wellbeing, your training. He—” His jaw works like he’s chewing glass.
The same expression I witnessed the day I was named flashes across his face, reminding me that somewhere, deep down, lives the man who might actually give a shit about us. “You never told me.”
“How could I when my brothers were being threatened if I talked?”
Father rears back, blinking, then clears his throat. “If I had known what he was doing, that he was threatening my sons, I would have stopped it.”
“Would you?” My rage suddenly drains, leaving me cold. Empty. “Would you have lectured him like you did me? Or would you have taken care of it like you did before?”
Fallon shoves his hands in his pockets, and rocks back on his heels but remains silent.
“You burned the orphanage down,” I say.
The silence stretches. I can practically see him sorting through his lies, deciding which version I deserve. The one in that small village paper or the actual truth.
Fallon sighs. “It was a difficult order, but they followed through. It was taken care of.”
I shove away from the mantle, raking fingers through my hair hard enough my nails scrape my scalp. The fact Father just admitted it is not nearly as shocking as what he just said.
We grew up hearing the rumors of the other school. Full of pretty girls who used their bodies to lure in their targets, then took them out quietly and efficiently, leaving no trace or evidence behind.
I never believed the rumors.
Until I was older.
Until I remembered.
“You sent the women to do it,” I say. “The girls from the other school.”
He turns away and unbuttons his vest, then loosens his pale blue tie. “I made you a promise when you were a boy, and I kept it. What that woman did to you was immoral, sick. She went to hell for what she did.”
“Fallon Byrns has morals?” I spit the words like venom. “You, Father, live by a strange set of morals.”
“They are what separate me from filth like Rune.” He rips at the button of his collar, yanking it open like it’s choking him. “From those sisters. From Caroline.”
“Bullshit,” I snarl, voice dropping dangerously low. “You sent 57 to Delilah knowing exactly what he was.”
“I sent my soldier to test her,” Father snaps.
“You sent a predator.” I step closer, invading his space. “How do you always miss it? The most evil ones slip past you. Makes me wonder if your ignorance is deliberate.”
Rage flashes in his eyes. He marches toward me, his pointer finger landing on my chest. “You may want to hold your tongue. Those are dangerous accusations.”
I grind my teeth, everything I want to say caught between my molars. How does he not see them for what they are? Why did he choose to ignore what was right in front of him? How many boys before me did he fail to protect? Did he blame?
How can he say he cares for us and then continue to hurt us?
My fingers twitch, itching to grab him by the throat. Watch his eyes bulge as I choke the lies from his mouth. But I tuck the urge away, knowing the only one who will hurt from my outburst will be the most innocent.
Delilah.
“What if she couldn’t defend herself? What if your fucking soldier had—” I can’t even say it, knowing firsthand what that violation feels like. “You would be responsible for what he did to her.”
His jaw pops as he peels off his vest with mechanical precision, folding it and placing it on the desk. “I’m not responsible for the actions of others. If Delilah had failed to protect herself, it would have proven she needed better training.”
“Jesus,” I mutter and stalk to the door, fighting the rage bubbling inside me.
At him. At myself. I don’t know why I bother.
He may care for us, even love us in some messed up way, but we all know that love is limited to what we can do for him.
And that changes based on what he needs from day to day.
Delilah is nothing but a means to an end.
Our affection for her gets in his way. Any emotion, any weakness at all, gets in the way.
He tried to carve the heart out of Reaper. Out of all of us.
He failed.
We didn’t break. And now we’re stronger together because we survived him.
We love fiercely despite him.
“Viper.” His voice slices through the air. My hand freezes on the doorknob. “I didn’t know, son.”
My jaw clenches. I turn slowly and catch a flicker of something almost human in his eyes. “You didn’t want to know.”
Father shakes his head, sitting behind the desk. He opens his laptop and taps at the keyboard as if I never spoke.
“Get her prepared,” he orders. “She is strong-willed and defiant, but she has grit.”
Rolling my shoulders, I take a deep breath to center my thoughts. We still have to complete the mission. Get into Rune’s safe. Then we’re done.
I nod. “We’ll make sure she is ready.”
“She’s beautiful. Graceful. An absolutely terrible soldier,” he says.
“But, Delilah is also intelligent, cunning, though her will outweighs her skill.” A faint smile touches his lips, making my stomach turn.
“Watching her this past week, I regret not taking her when she was young. With the right training, she would have made a lovely ballerina.”