Chapter 2
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Family dinners are scary.
Clara
“You must be Morana,” Lukas purrs, planting a hand against the counter where a woman with long black hair is cutting a loaf of garlic bread. “What’s a beauty like you been doing hiding from me all my life?”
Morana cuts her gaze up and down Lukas before stating, “No.”
Immediately, Lukas pulls back, lifts his hands, and says, “Understood. Anything I can help with?”
“We’ve got it covered if you want to take a seat.”
“You got it.” He then rounds the island counter, approaches the long kitchen table, and takes the seat beside me.
Awed, I stare at the dark-haired woman while she—entirely unbothered—brings the basket of cut garlic bread to the table and sashays back to get more.
I’m sorry. What? What just happened? It’s that simple? I could have given Lukas a hefty once over, said no, and been left in peace yesterday?
Morana must teach me these life skills.
I’ve never seen anything more beautiful, and I am seated at a table surrounded by nine models.
Everyone here is gorgeous, glowing, moisturized, in their lane! Probably. Allegedly.
Not Lukas, though.
Lukas swerved into my lane, cowboy lassoed my poor little junker car, and started off on a joyride with me in tow.
But everyone else? Everyone else seems like the kinds of people who stay in their lane in their armored, untouchable vehicles, cheerfully putting along.
Among the women, I only recognize Maelin from an article I saw about her and Zakery two and a half months ago.
They attended the Creator’s Ball together, looking like a prince and princess.
That royal air about them has not lifted.
In perfect contrast to her twin sister Morana—the dark queen of saying no—Maelin’s long white hair and gleaming green eyes make her look ethereal in ways that match Lukas’s imposing stature and chilling heterochromia.
She’s beauty. She’s grace—
She’s…just spilled water all down her shirt after failing to correctly drink it…
One second, her glass was at her lips; the next, water. Everywhere.
Fighting not to laugh beside her, Zakery shakes like a leaf while he helps clean her up. She keeps murmuring things like stop it and it’s not funny and I just made this blouse.
I fix my attention on the damp blouse: a very pretty pink and white top, trimmed with much lace and princessness. It’s beautiful. Incredible. And she just made it? Herself? With her own two hands? Is that what she just said? Is that what she meant by that statement?
I…I’m very much out of my league, aren’t I?
I don’t even know where to begin in an effort to make friends with these beautiful, talented people.
Viktor doesn’t seem comfortable having me here, so talking to him is out.
I’m not the most comfortable around men, period, so striking up a conversation with the other brothers is a nope.
And the women…they’re angels. I don’t know how to talk to angels.
It feels like they should be approaching me all do not be afraid style at their own discretion.
My attention falls on the pretty brunette seated to the right of Viktor at one head of the table.
She’s the one Viktor is going to be marrying in April, I think.
Crisis. She’s the Canva Whiteboard mastermind—which means her skillset isn’t god-tier.
Bless. If anyone here is accessible for befriending, it’s going to be either her or Morana, and I fear Morana is far too chillingly cool for me to so much as behold; therefore, it’s got to be Crisis.
I open my mouth to greet her when—suddenly—Crimson, the tall redhead seated across from me, beside Crisis, launches upright, throws her arm out, and intercepts a grape heading straight for Crisis’s face.
“Oops,” Kyran mutters, grimacing as he sets the fruit bowl he’s holding down. “Sorry.”
“You should be more careful,” Morana snaps.
“I said sorry,” Kyran grits.
Crimson pops the grape in her mouth and shakes her head.
But Crisis clasps her hands together, beholding Crimson as though her life has been spared. “My hero. My love. My knight in shining armor. The reason I wake each morning with breath in my lungs.”
“Worry not, dearness,” Crimson soothes, cupping Crisis’s face as rose petals swirl around them in a befuddling frenzy because I could have sworn Crisis was marrying Vikor? A la male lead, she says, “I’ll always protect you.”
Okay… So. Three’s a crowd. Got it. I’ll just…sit here, then. Maybe eat some garlic bread. Try not to feel intimidated. Or adrift. In an ocean of hot people.
Death by drowning in pheromones is certainly not the worst way to go.
Oh, come on, girlie pop! I take a deep breath and encourage myself. Let’s look on the bright side, Clara! You have yet to be sexually assaulted!
Yay!
Yay?
Yaaay…
Yikes.
The bar is participating in a game of limbo with the devil.
Munching a piece of garlic bread that has appeared on my plate, I keep my head down, eyes focused on the lasagna that seems to have also materialized on my plate.
It’s a heaping helping. It’s the sort of helping Mom would scorn and condemn as a detriment to my figure, before suggesting I join whatever new diet she’s trying as though most of them haven’t reminded me of the Dragon Warrior diet in Kung Fu Panda.
That is to say, they consist entirely of universe juice and dew.
This time, when veggies appear on my plate, I locate the serving spoon they’re tumbling off of and follow the arm to Lukas, hithertofore known as: the culprit.
I’m not sure whether I should be grateful or offended that Lukas dumped this much food in my plate while I was trying to scope out the atmosphere.
I know I’m chubby, but the majority of my weight can’t exactly be helped without surgery, and the rest is sincerely an effort at proportioning my top-heaviness for optimal comfort.
You know. So I don’t snap in two when I lean forward.
I exist in a world of back pain and difficulty breathing.
Sometimes I don’t know if I’m having an anxiety attack, or if it’s just the darned weight of the world on my bra straps again.
Exercise is hard. Life is hard.
Food is good.
Food does not betray me.
I opt not to think about whether or not Lukas thinks I eat like a horse as I drown my worries in cheesy carbs and glean information from the conversations swirling around me.
Muttering in Kyran’s direction, Morana says, “Why can’t you put your phone away at the table?”
“Why can’t you mind your business?” he mutters back, eyes fixed on his device.
Maelin whispers, “Should I just change my shirt? I don’t want to get tomato sauce on it. I should probably at least wear an apron. Just in case.”
Amid the mostly amicable chatter, so long as we ignore Kyran and Morana’s bickering, Lukas cuts in like a bullet train, fixing his attention on Viktor to ask, “How much budget can I have for Clara?”
Viktor chokes on his bite of lasagna.
Once Zakery’s wife skitters off to presumably get an apron, Zakery smirks and sees fit to add fuel to the simmering chaos. “I had roughly thirty thousand for Maelin.”
My stomach drops out of my body.
He adds, “But she needed fancy sewing stuff.”
Lukas notes, “Clara needs fancy baking stuff.”
“Are sewing things and baking things comparable in price?” Zakery ponders. “Aren’t there more appliances for cooking?”
Lukas hums. “I believe so.” He angles himself to look at their lavish kitchen. “We might have a portion of them already…but they may not be what Clara likes.”
What is he even talking about?
Their entire kitchen is KitchenAid. Like.
The professional grade stuff. And I’m pretty dang sure Morana was using a freaking Wüsthof knife on the garlic bread a moment ago.
As someone who has only ever hand-kneaded dough, I think I’ll be more than satisfied with what is currently available here.
Nevertheless, since I cannot find it in myself to speak up, Zakery plows on, “In that case, maybe fifty grand.”
Airflow cuts off, and I tell myself it’s just my breasts! The big inconvenient jerks! This is not an anxiety attack. No, no. It’s never anxiety! It’s always just my silly mammary glands. Ruining my life! Again.
“Excellent,” Lukas cheers. “In that case, Viktor, I’ll be spending roughly fifty grand tonight.”
The air shifts. Darkens. Grows heavy.
And…maybe this is a panic attack, actually.
Stoically, Viktor plants his hands on the table and rises through the pudding-thick air. “Lukas. A word?”
“Sonder,” Lukas supplies. “An excellent word. The feeling that one receives upon realizing every person is a unique, untold story. You’re welcome to it.” Relaxing as though the air isn’t melted chocolate in my lungs, he smiles to himself. “Benevolent King, me.”
Viktor does not appear to appreciate this word, because in four seconds, he crosses behind Lukas’s chair, pinches the giant man’s ear, and drags him out of the room.
Leaving me alone…with a plate full of Stouffer’s lasagna…and the dire need to fend for myself.