Chapter 15 Poppy #2
It was difficult not allowing my own frustrations to get to me, but Azrael’s games required patience, listening. So, that’s what I would do. “No,” I answered truthfully. “I know you aren’t behind the church.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes,” I answered quickly.
He shrugged. “It would make sense. Born into the hierarchy, living around their rules, their lifestyle. Nobody knows who I am. It would be so easy to slip into the main church here in Seattle, check things out, buy the Blessing for myself, train her to be the Queen so when I take over, she’ll be so infatuated with me, she wouldn’t be able to say no. ”
It would make sense, that didn’t mean it was true. “That girl would never agree to that, and you care about kids too much to let any of this happen. Even before you gained control over yourself, you never would have agreed to this. Next.”
He searched my eyes. “What else did he say?”
It wasn’t a confirmation, but it wasn’t denial either. I adjusted myself in the chair. “That you tried to kill me enough times that I should want to bring you in.”
“And you?”
I snorted. “I’m obviously here to take you in. Let’s go.” I gave him a look.
His expression dried.
“Is it him?”
He didn’t reply.
I frowned and straightened. “I know you like playing these games and you have your whole ‘patience’ thing, and you have steps or whatever it is you’re thinking that rationalizes this for you, but if it’s him, you need to tell me.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s our fucking father, Az,” I bit, my heart picking up at the sudden anger I felt. “He practically raised us, gave us everything we needed to become who we are now. It’s a fucking betrayal, and we deserve to know why he betrayed us. We deserve to know the truth.”
“Why?” he asked again. “So you can stew in that feeling? So you can plot a death you will never have the chance to take? That’s childish.”
I stood up and rushed the desk, slamming my hands down on it. “Sometimes we just want to know the truth, Azrael. Was it Malachi? Was it Beckett? Is it you?”
He didn’t react at all to my accusation, he only stared angrily at me.
I snarled and straightened. “If I find out that you’re the one who did this, I’ll fucking kill you.”
“You will fail.”
I laughed and shook my head. “You don’t know everything, Az.”
The door opened and I immediately wiped my emotions as I turned. I didn’t need the world seeing what he did to me. This was our business, not the business of his so-called friends.
But it wasn’t any of the brothers who walked in.
Scarlett looked so tiny as she walked in wearing one of Azrael’s black, button down shirts, completely undone and barely clinging to her breasts, her pussy out for all to see.
She yawned, clinging to a beautiful stuffed rabbit as she made her way barefoot towards us.
I stepped back, watching as she headed straight for Azrael, not sparing me even a glance.
In fact, she still looked like she was asleep.
I turned back to Azrael, my brows furrowing as he pushed away from his desk and held open his arms, his eyes hardly softened. “Is she sleep-walking?”
She crawled into his arms, pulling her knees up to her chest, shoving her feet between his legs, her toes under his thigh.
“Yes,” he answered, allowing her to fold into him, her head falling just under his.
I studied the way she curled right into him, as if she felt safe. “Has she always done that?”
His eyes filled with ice as they met mine. “Our minds latch onto tragedy like a drug. Even if we heal, even if we become monsters, the tragedy still exists.”
I studied her face, how…how young she looked, how her bottom lip quivered and her brows pulled together ever so slightly. “She’s terrified,” I realized.
“Just because I placed her in my Hell doesn’t mean she ever escaped hers. I appreciate you not giving in to your creator’s little request,” he said coldly, causing me to frown, “but I won’t give you the answers you seek.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re answers you don’t need.”
“You don’t get to decide that, Azrael.”
“I do,” he retorted quietly.
“No, you don’t.”
“Yes, I do,” he threatened.
I worked my jaw. “Why?”
“Because whatever they did to all of us, however many times they used us as pawns, at least they gave us the power to fight back. She never got that power. She was born to fuck, to be owned, to reproduce. She was born into slavery, born to be on her knees, on her back. So whatever anger you’re feeling, get rid of it.
Her mind was shattered because of them, she deserves to shatter theirs in return. ”
I studied them carefully, studied the way his hand rested around her waist, the way his head was tilted slightly down, the way he shifted, clearly uncomfortable, allowing himself to be so in order to make her feel safe.
I straightened. “I’m spending the night tonight, and whatever training you’re putting her through in the morning, I want to be a part of it.”
Azrael searched my eyes for several seconds before he adjusted her in his arms and finally stood. “She has a kill to make after breakfast and then she can show you what we’ve taught her.” He started for the door. “Be warned, Red, she has a blade now, and she doesn’t hold back.”
But I didn’t care. I wouldn’t care if she sliced my arm off and I had to learn to fight without it. I didn’t care if she mutilated me to the point of death.
I didn’t care.
The man who hated even the slightest brush of a hand did have a heart, and she was curled in his arms, protected from the world in the eye of the storm.