Page 98 of Rapunzel Is Losing It

“Yeah babe, that’s why it’s called family business, not family love fest.” Natalia rolled her eyes at me. “Some of us just suck it up and do what’s expected of us.”

“You can’t have it both ways. You can’t play by your father’s rules and not expect him to enforce them on your sister.”

“This isn’t helping,” Irina grunted and stopped her pacing to glance at me. “Look, we never assumed we’d die of old age. We know what we were born into, okay? But the second I walk off this property without my family’s protection, I’m dead. Not how I saw this going.”

“You’re coming with us,” Victor replied without missing a beat.

I nodded in agreement. “You’ll be safe as long as you stay at my place. You know how secure my house is.”

“No offense, but I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in your house, Cordelia.” Irina crossed her arms over her chest.

“If I may offer a different perspective,” Daniel capped his flask, “it seems to me that all problems started with her.” He tilted his head towards me, and I stiffened.

Victor straightened behind me, his grip loosening. He’d steadied me for my benefit, but I had watched his body move through enough fights. The videos were burned into my brain. I knew the subtle stance adjustments.

Luka held up a hand in front of me and Victor, turning his attention to his brother-in-law. “The girl just ended up in the middle of it all by association. Just like you.”

Daniel dragged his eyes from Luka to his wife and pursed his lips, but didn’t say anything else.

“Luka,” Victor said, voice low.

They looked at each other, quietly tilting their heads and having a conversation none of us were invited to, until Luka subtly shook his head.

“What was that about?” I whispered.

He kissed the top of my head. “I’ll tell you later, zhizn’ moya.”

Luka flexed his jaw and looked back and forth between Victor and me. “Fine,” he huffed, “fine. We don’t drag the girls into it. Paris.”

“Excuse you?” Irina waved her bandaged hand through the air. “We’re already in it.”

”I’m not,” Natalia mumbled. Before anyone could say anything about that, Daniel took her hand and gently pulled her out of the room.

“Still,” Victor said, his arms tightening around me again now that Daniel was gone, “we shouldn’t discuss ithere. Irina, you’ll come with us for now. Luka?”

”I’ll let you know.”

“Then it’s settled.” Victor loosened behind me. “Come on, Cordelia. There’s something I want you to see.”

One glance between the cousins and Luka sighed and tossed Victor his key fob.

I thought I’d had wordless communication with Victor down, but these two operated on another level.

Victor took me to a room just a few doors down the hallway. The room was fairly simple compared to all the modern touches everywhere else. A bed pushed into one corner with a mirror next to it, a small desk under the window, a chest of drawers covered in faded stickers with a small TV on it, and a punching bag in the corner.Oh.

”This is your room.”

He hummed in confirmation.

I turned from him to the chest of drawers, where I let my fingers glide over the stickers. Most of them were UFC-branded in some way. The others all seemed to be souvenir stickers from different places. Las Vegas was there a lot, but some of them were from much further away, Brazil, Australia, the Emirates. “Have you been to all these places?”

He nodded.

”For fights?”

He nodded again.

He’d been all over the world. Maybe he’d still be collecting stickers if his brain hadn’t taken him out of the ring. ”Do you miss it? Traveling?”