chapter 15
Avira
I inspect every corner of my room, searching for any signs of cameras. The thought of being under someone’s surveillance is deeply unnerving.
Considering the kind of technology Zoan uses, it would be nearly impossible for me to detect anything if there were cameras here. Frustrated, I storm out of the room.
I reach the living room. Leo is gone, and Zoan sits hunched forward, elbows braced on his knees, head bowed low. I swear, if I had the superpower to see energy in colors, I would have seen black smoke radiating off him.
I clear my throat. His head lifts. Damn. He looks like he’s just murdered someone. My gaze instantly drops to the floor, searching for any sign of Leo’s corpse.
I had come here in a particularly violent mood, but compared to his aura—violent enough to suffocate—the little violence inside me shrinks into an ant and runs off.
“I wanted to ask something,” I say, forcing calm into my voice.
He gives a curt nod.
“Are there cameras in my room as well?”
He shakes his head.
His eyes say he isn’t lying, and I have no choice but to believe him.
I step closer, and with each pace, his gaze darkens further. The muscle in his clean-shaven jaw tightens, hardened in restraint. Is he angry at me?
I stop right in front of him and slowly extend my hand, patting his head. The moment my palm meets the silky strands of his black hair, I shift from patting to rubbing, craving the feel of his scalp beneath my fingers, wanting to run them from root to tip.
“What are you doing?” His voice drops, colder than zero degrees.
I retract my hand quickly. “I was trying to pat away your bad mood.”
He stands up from the couch, and I instinctively take a few steps back. He looks like a mountain—tall, broad, immovable. His aura is still cold enough to freeze an entire city, but I dare to think I managed to pat away at least a fraction of the ice.
“I’m going to the office. If you need anything, ask the staff,” he says flatly.
I nod.
Once he leaves, I also leave the living room and return to my room. Dropping onto my bed with my phone, I make a call to Wen. I’m in serious trouble now, and I have no choice but to let the cat out of the bag.
She picks up almost instantly. “How are you?” she asks.
“I’m good.”
Her eyes narrow as she studies me. “You do look… good,” she says with a faint frown.
I slide up, pressing my half-upper body against the headboard. “How much do you love me?”
One of her brows arches. “To the moon and back.”
I roll my eyes. “That’s exactly what you write in every digital birthday card.”
She grins. “Because it’s the truth.”
“Umm… what if I told you I kidnapped someone?”
Her head jerks, and she glances around. “Wait, let me go to my room. I’m in the kitchen,” she mutters under her breath.
She dashes upstairs, heaving slightly as she closes the door behind her.
“Who the hell have you kidnapped?”
I shrug. “No one. I was just asking what you’d do.”
She sighs audibly, shaking her head before settling on her bed. Well, good. I need her seated for the kind of conversation I’m about to have.
“So, in case you ever do decide to kidnap someone in the future, I’ll have no choice but to help you hide them.”
I grin. “And what if I kill someone?”
She narrows her eyes. “I really hope you won’t ever do such a thing. But if you end up doing it… I’ll dig the grave in our farm.”
I bite the corner of my lip. “And what if I tell you I love someone I should not love?”
Her face freezes, horror spreading across her features. “Please. Tell. Me. It’s. Not. Zo.”
“How do you know?”
She shoots up from the bed, running a frantic hand through her hair, pacing like a madwoman, her expression twisting into strange faces before she finally drops back down again.
“I suspected it for a long time, but I was praying it wasn’t true.
” She drags her palm down her face. “Have you completely lost your mind? Out of billions of people, you fall in love with your brother? It would’ve been so much better if you’d fallen for Pa’s old butler.
” She yanks the phone closer to her face, eyes wide. “Undo your love. This can’t happen.”
Then, as abruptly as a storm, she flings the phone onto her bed. Her voice carries faintly from a distance, ragged with despair. “But… is it even possible to undo love? What have you done?” A groan escapes her before she snatches the phone back up, the screen shaking in her hand. “Does he know?”
I shake my head.
She exhales a long, heavy sigh and falls silent. Her eyes are on me, but her mind is elsewhere, most likely conjuring the worst possible outcomes of this forbidden mess. She’s always been the best at imagining catastrophes.
Finally, she shakes her head, her voice low but sharp. “No. This can’t happen. How will you ever show your face to anyone? And even if you shamelessly manage to, how will Uncle and Aunt show theirs?”
I know this all too well.
She finally focuses on me. “So, this is what’s been tormenting you all this time.”
I nod.
She presses her lips together before giving a solid nod.
“Fuck it. We’ll deal with the consequences.
Isn’t love always about facing the hard consequences?
Just stop drowning yourself in guilt. Your love may not be the ideal, peaceful one, but it’s yours, and I’ll support my sister’s love over anything else.
I’ll stand beside you. We’ll share the tomatoes thrown at you. ”
I sigh. “I know how wrong I am in loving him, but I can’t help it.
It happened so slowly that by the time I realized, I was already at the bottom of the deepest pit.
And the worst part is, I don’t even want to climb out.
” My eyes blur with tears. “I want to love him more and more, Wen. Even knowing how wrong it is.”
“Stop beating yourself up over it. Have you forgotten our motto? ‘We’ll give our heart to only one person and never take it back.’ This is the kind of love we always dreamed of.
So what if you found it in your adopted brother?
Okay… it changes the entire dynamic, but that doesn’t make it a sin.
Alright, maybe it’s a little sinful… but that doesn’t make it wrong.
Fine, it’s wrong, but we can’t do anything about it. ”
I let out a soft chuckle at her tangled reasoning. She wants to support me, yet she can’t fully overlook the wrongness in it.
She mumbles to herself for a couple of minutes, setting her phone aside before finally showing me a thumbs up and then her face.
“I’ve collected the points to prove your love is not wrong.
” She sits straighter, resting her back against the headboard.
“First, he’s not related to you by blood.
Second, he cares too much for you, so it’s only natural for you to feel something toward him.
Third, everyone knows how he looks. Fourth, he’s a genius, so it’s practical to want to have children with him, your kids would be born with his good genes.
And my fifth point seals it, he has a massive female fan following.
” She pauses. “What? Don’t make that ugly face.
Did you forget? Women are instinctively drawn to men whom many others desire, because it increases the chances of having an attractive son like that man and passing on multiple copies of her genes as well. ”
I blink slowly. “No one is going to believe this bullshit.”
“We don’t need anyone to believe it. It’s not for them, it’s for us. Especially you. You need to stop telling yourself that you’re committing some unforgivable crime by loving him.”
I nod. She’s right. I need to pull myself out of this trap of shame and guilt.
“So, what’s the big problem? Surely you didn’t call me just to give me an update.” She narrows her eyes.
I giggle. “I’m not exactly proud of my feelings, so I kept them hidden.
” My expression turns serious. “But now I’m in trouble.
Today Zoan asked me what’s bothering me, and he was relentless about it.
With the level of intelligence he has, it won’t take him long to figure it out. What should I do now?”
“Let him know,” she says firmly.
“And what do you think he’ll do? Kiss me?” I deadpan.
She bursts out laughing. “Isn’t that exactly what you want?”
I purse my lips, refusing to answer.
“Okay, jokes apart but seriously, let him know. And something tells me his love and care for you aren’t entirely brotherly either.”
That makes several fuses in my head blow at once. “Whatttttt!!!”
She shrugs casually. “I’ve had this feeling ever since I first understood what love even is, at least five years now. You can always test the waters.”
A new wave of excitement rushes through me. “How?”
She grins, her grin only stretching wider as she leans closer. “See his reaction… between his legs.”
My eyes nearly pop out of their sockets. “You are not asking me to seduce him!”
She nods without hesitation. “Look, babe, your choices are simple, either stay dry and depressed or enjoy life first… and then get depressed later.”
I tilt my head, acknowledging her logic even if it’s insane.
“But I can’t seduce him. What if he really thinks of me as his sister and I end up making a fool of myself?”
She hums thoughtfully. “That’s true. Then do it subtly. Make it look like you didn’t even do it on purpose.”
A mischievous grin spreads across my face. “I’ve got an idea.”