Page 48 of Little Wing (Shades of Fairhaven #1)

“ O h Silas—you should have seen it. It was so natural just speaking to them and seeing their faces light up when they realized they truly weren’t alone!” Lotus drew in a breath before speeding up ahead of me. Her joy impossible to ignore. “They were so amazing!” she giggled. “Absolutely amazing!”

A chuckle vibrated at the base of my throat as I listened and studied her.

I didn’t know how she did it. How did she manage to still have so much light to share after others tried to put it out for centuries?

Besides what she went through on her own, it was hard to forget the events of the last few weeks.

Truly an absolute shitshow. But when Lotus was on the verge of skipping down the sidewalk, I tried to focus on the light in front of me, on the woman who refused to be seen as broken.

“Seems Little Wing suits you—you sure I can’t poach you from the bookstore?” I smirked, reaching to pull her back to my side.

“You’d have to go through Reina on that one, and I know she won’t let me go.” When I leaned over to kiss her cheek, she pursed her lips and hummed, contemplating. “But I won’t say no to volunteering.”

“You guys still planning on opening up your own bookstore? ”

“And café,” she quickly added as she confirmed. “Yes, and yes. I think after everything, it’s time we move forward and focus on trying to make this happen.”

She had a point, and it reminded me so much of myself and Mateo when we made the decision to make Little Wing happen.

It was a chance that we were willing to take, and we were thankful it paid off.

As much as I wanted Lotus to pursue her passions with her friends, I couldn’t deny how much I loved seeing her around Little Wing.

Aside from the obvious bonus of her actual proximity to me, I loved seeing her light up the room when she made someone feel less alone.

When we finally made it to her apartment building, she took me by the hand and led me up the few flights of stairs to her unit.

I watched as she pulled her keys out of her purse and twirled them around before stopping abruptly.

She stared at the door for a few seconds longer than made me comfortable.

But before I could ask if anything was wrong, she went to turn the key to unlock her door and froze.

Though she tried to conceal her distress, I knew better than to stay back and moved in front of her.

“It’s… unlocked,” Lotus uttered.

As soon as those words left her mouth, I whipped my head back to the door where Lotus’s keys still hung.

Moving closer, I looked around the door frame until my eyes settled on what I realized Lotus was looking at—scratches on the door handle and harsh black scuff marks on the bottom of the door.

Before I pushed it open, Lotus grabbed onto my wrist. If she thought I was going to let her go in without me checking it out first then she was out of her mind.

“Lotus, stay out here while I—”

“Silas,” she cut in, her voice quaking. “I-I hear music.”

I bobbed my head slowly and signaled for her to stay quiet and outside in the hall while I pushed the door open.

Inside, the apartment looked normal enough until I turned my head to the side.

In the living room, her decorative pillows were torn to shreds, their innards littered around the couch.

The candles from her coffee table lay in pieces just before the kitchen where cabinet doors were left open and utensils were scattered around the floor.

What the fuck? The apartment was a fucking mess, but I continued moving further in. If I hadn’t come here with her, what would she have come home to? Or better yet—who?

I continued looking around the apartment while Lotus slowly stepped inside, closing the door quietly behind her.

She wasn’t wrong about the music. I could hear it coming clearly from her bedroom—the soft grainy buzz of her record player that I knew she loved to have on while she got ready each evening, now spinning in the presence of someone unwelcome.

The song stopped and restarted again, playing “Tonight You Belong to Me” by Patience and Prudence.

The music only grew louder with each step that I took toward Lotus’s room down the short hall, mentally preparing for whatever I would find inside.

When I finally made it, I leaned in to find her bed messy and her floor covered in cans of synthetic blood.

Someone was definitely here, but they weren’t in her bedroom. Not anymore.

Just as I moved to turn back around, the door to the bathroom burst open and a dark-haired man growled and hurled himself at me.

The force of his body slammed me against the wall opposite the rooms, hitting my head on one of the many frames that decorated the wall.

The crunch of the glass and the crack in the wall alerted Lotus from the other room.

It was when her panicked voice sounded and the man holding me twitched that I realized who the intruder was.

I took one whiff of him and snarled at the man with damp black hair—Luca.

I pushed against his shoulders to force him off me, but as I did, he looked up through the curtain of his messy hair to realize I wasn’t the person he was looking to attack. He stood straight and quickly darted his eyes to where Lotus was standing with her hands held up in defense.

“Sister,” he sneered. “You are tough to track down when your scent is all over this fucking town. It’s almost like you’re hiding from me.” He shot a chilling glare back at me, the droplets from his wet hair whipping me across the cheek.

“What are you doing here?” she asked. “I did not speak your name or utter your crimes. Why can’t you just leave me be?”

Luca wasted little time moving out of the hall and to the main room where Lotus now stood with her fists clenched at her sides.

He assessed her slowly, taking careful steps closer to her, like a fucking predator cornering its prey.

Given that I wasn’t his target, I used his focus on her to my benefit and quickly rushed around the kitchen island to step between them.

With a quick tug, I pulled Lotus behind me without my eyes leaving the lunatic before us for a second.

Her brother was a bit taller than Lotus, but it wasn’t his stature that gave me the creeps.

It was the way he tried to devour her with his eyes—the wicked grin that spread to reveal his fangs, even the chipped one.

“Answer me! Why won’t you leave me?” she demanded.

Luca paced, hunched over, without advancing closer. He was playing with his meal, drawing out his torment without even having to lift a finger. My eyes never left him.

“Why won’t you leave me?” Lotus repeated, her voice sounding more fractured than it did just moments ago.

“Because,” he snarled. “You’ve had enough time fucking around, sister. You know you don’t belong here.”

“But, I do! ”

Luca stopped pacing and turned his head to the side, lazily pointing his lanky index finger at me. “Because of him ?”

“I have family here. I’ve made a home!” Lotus cried.

Looking unimpressed, Luca glanced around the mess he created. “A bit tacky for my taste.”

“Enough—gods damn it!” Lotus pleaded, her hands scrunching the back of my shirt in her hands.

“No.”

With both of them in the same room, I felt the rage in the pit of my stomach threaten to boil over.

Knowing that it was him that starved the woman I love and long to protect, I wanted nothing more than to put him through the same misery Lotus had to experience.

Because of his torment, I had to fight for even a glimpse of her smile when we first met.

Behind me, I felt Lotus vibrating not in fear, but in anger. What I thought was her trembling was the buildup to a growl that erupted from her as she stepped in front of me. Even as Lotus raised her voice, Luca barely flinched.

He slicked his wet hair back and rolled his eyes at her. “Seriously? You let someone new fuck you and now you think you can talk back to me? I think you’ve forgotten your place."

“Luca—” Lotus flinched, stopping just a foot in front of me.

“Enough!” he hissed, using her line against her.

“I made you, saved you, and I can unmake you if I see fit. You thought you were free of me just because you packed up your shit and left? Oh no-no-no,” he cackled, the ruby of his eyes glistening in a way that Lotus’s never had.

“I just gave you a longer lead while I got my own shit in order.”

It was pure malice that overcame him when he thrust his arm out to yank Lotus away from me. I barely had a second to react before she was pressed up against him with her face cupped in his palm .

“Lotus!” I yelled, my voice heavy with desperation as I immediately stepped toward them. “Let her go!”

Luca ignored me completely while his hands roamed Lotus’s body with unnatural hunger.

My mind was calculating how quickly I could move to pull her away from him, how quickly I could knock him the fuck out for laying a hand on her again.

But as I thought to rush at him, I froze when his hand tightened around her throat that he yanked back to sniff.

Fucking fuck! Think, Silas. Think!

“She’s done nothing wrong, Luca,” I seethed, doing everything I could to keep my rage in check. It did get his attention.

“Did she not tell you about Wesley? How she slurped up his blood like a vicious little cat?” He cocked a brow.

“H-h-he,” Lotus stammered, trying to catch a breath. I could hear her teeth chattering from where I stood, ready to run to her the moment I’d find an opening. “He knows… everything!”

“Right…” Luca hummed, tracing his bony finger along her alabaster skin.

I needed to figure this out quickly. My eyes darted around the room, seeking a solution to this madness until my eyes found Lotus's. Despite tears rolling down her cheeks, her eyes never left me. I hated how paralyzed she looked. I hated that I didn’t keep her behind me the entire time.

Better yet—I regret not forcing her out of the apartment completely for me to deal with this psychopath on my own.

Just hold on a little longer, Lotus. Just hold on…

“I think she needs a reminder of who she belongs to, don’t you?” Luca grinned wickedly before pressing his lips against her neck. “That’ll teach you not to run again. After all the kindness I showed since creating you. ”

All I recalled seeing was the way her eyes bulged as he sank his fangs into her neck, just barely a few inches from where he left his mark on her years ago.

He inhaled deeply, clutching her tightly against his body as he lapped up the black blood that dripped down her exposed skin.

After a few gulps, he pulled away and pushed her down to her knees.

And unlucky for him, because in that moment I saw nothing but red.

While he was busy licking up his sister’s blood from his hands, I rushed at him, pounding my fist into his jaw.

The loud crack fueled the rage boiling inside me.

As he stumbled back with his hand over his mouth, I moved quickly to help Lotus up to her feet. When she was far away enough from the stumbling idiot, I turned back around and gave my hand a quick shake.

New rage burned in his eyes, but this time I was ready.

As Luca growled curses and swung his fist, I met him hit-for-hit before slamming him down to the ground.

But before I could give into the rage that begged me to pummel him beyond recognition, I heard Lotus’s pained cries cut through the mess of growls and labored panting.

Luca remained pinned down on the ground with my forearm against his throat.

The shadow of the woman I loved approached us. She made no effort to cover her wound and allowed for her blood to splatter on the floor. Over my shoulder, I could see her eyes were red from crying. Black blood slithered down her neck and into the valley between her breasts.

Then, she spoke.

“You think this has been a kindness?” she hissed.