Page 5

WES

April—Six Months Prior

M y head whipped to the left from the impact. My feet remained planted on the ground.

Solid.

Heavy.

Rock.

I refused to touch my face. I deserved the sting the back of his hand delivered. He always hit hard. Held nothing back. But today it wasn’t hard enough.

“How could you have been so reckless?” My father’s voice boomed in his office.

My eyes remained on the floor. Brows furrowed in anger and hate.

But not towards him. Not today.

At myself.

“Because of you, your brother is DEAD!”

I grimaced. Closed my eyes.

“He’s dead! Burned alive for all to hear him scream! A spectacle for the world to watch brEAK!”

SMACK!

My head whipped to the right. I let it roll forward, chin tucked to my chest.

“You are a disease . A plague . A dog whose only purpose is to take up space !”

SMACK!

To the left again, cheek aflame. My head lolled forward once more.

“You are worthless!” he spat. “Of the sons for God to rob me of, he made a fucking mistake !”

SMACK!

Another hit. Another sting. Another pain well deserved.

“So help me, Wes, you will obey. You will do as you’re told. And you will pay for what you’ve done.”

Disease.

Plague

Cancer.

I brought death into my home. And for what?

For her.

For the taste of her skin.

For a plunge in the ocean of her eyes.

I was worthless. Undeserving. An animal.

And if I wasn’t careful, I was going to become a younger version of my sire.

Perhaps I already was.

***

“Dude, I thought you liked the girl?” Rincon pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose .

I curled again. Pain dug sharp fingers into the muscles of my arm. Slowly, I brought down the dumbbell only to curl it again.

“Hey, are you listening? She’s staying. The whole freaking camp is talking about it. I kind of thought you’d be happier.”

I worked my jaw. Felt the burn. Curled again.

“ Dude , Wes, what gives, brother? Are you going to talk to me or ignore me like a jackass?”

I trained my eyes on the weight as it rose toward my face and then fell back towards the ground in a controlled motion. Sweat dripped down my temple.

There was no explaining it to him. No one would understand.

Mara wasn’t mine. And because I wanted her to be, my brother died. It wasn’t her fault; it was mine . But having her here…

Seeing her practically naked, dripping wet…

And those eyes. Watching them light up like the moon on the darkest night. Like the sun after a hurricane.

Those eyes…

I was ready to fall back into them. Swim as deep as I could go. Listen to every story they told, every song they sang.

And then she said his name.

Chase.

Even in death, my brother haunted me. Even after watching him burn alive, she still asked for him. Looked for him.

Saw. Only. Him .

And why wouldn’t she?

I was no one.

I was just the spare.

The leftover. The mistake that should have died so Chase could live.

And then Matias showed up, and he fucking dared to look at me like I was some sort of psychopath. Like I was some sort of animal .

Crazed.

Unpredictable .

Violent.

All because I held a blade I’d been tasked with sharpening.

I didn’t know she was there. That she was vulnerable. Fragile. Naked .

And even if I did, I wasn’t going to hurt her. I would never hurt her.

I wanted her so badly, I was ready to carve out my own heart with a knife. To sacrifice my soul to the first devil who promised me her love. And in a way, I had. Paid for it with my brother’s life.

That’s when I knew I needed her gone. She had to leave.

Because only an animal wouldn’t give a fuck that she belonged to someone else.

Only a demented, crazed sociopath would take his brother’s bride after killing him.

Only someone like my father would do something like that—take a woman knowing she was someone else’s.

Force her to be his when she was in love with someone else.

I couldn’t do that.

I refused to do that.

She had to leave. Because if she stayed, I was afraid I couldn’t control myself. Afraid I couldn’t bury the feelings I had for her deep enough inside. I couldn’t afford to become the petal of a fresh white rose. Not again.

She had to leave.

I had to remain stone.

***

October—Present Day

Things needed to happen fast. She had already been stuck in the prison for ten days.

Two hundred and forty hours.

Fourteen thousand, four hundred minutes.

Eight hundred, sixty-four thousand seconds .

It was ten days too many.

Because only god knew what was happening beyond those walls. Every time my father left for the prison and came back, he returned with a face only a demon could appreciate. It took everything inside of me—every bone, every muscle, every tendon—to contain the tempest inside.

Because I was kerosene.

I was gasoline.

I was nitroglycerin.

I was TNT with a fuse too short to escape.

And the only thing that held me together was a circle of platinum.

A single canary diamond.

A symbol of what I had and lost.

But I was going to get her back. Regardless of her affections. Regardless of whether she loved me or not, I was going to get her back.

“Wes? Did you need something?” My mother was anything but a feeble creature. Slender build, tall, and classic in her beauty. With blonde hair that fell in curvy waves across her shoulders, and eyes that looked more like jewels of amber. My eyes were hers.

I stepped into the library, closing the door behind me.

I could always find her here. She spent her time reading, devouring word after word of books made from black ink and yellowed pages from a time before my existence.

She made it her mission to rescue tomes of the past. Made it her objective to preserve the histories of the world in paper form.

She was a guardian in the Library of Alexandria, preserving a world come and gone.

And she made me read.

She made us read.

Poetry and plays and stories of love and war. Histories of countries and cultures and religions across the sea.

She made us read, but Chase found it boring. Found more enjoyment in listening to our father tell him how he could rule the world .

But I read with her.

I filled my head with letters and words and iambic pentameter.

But all it did was make me hope for something that would never come.

Because hope was a painful thing. A deadly thing.

Because that was one thing Shakespeare got right—love was nothing more than a tragedy.

“Wes?”

I fell into the wingback chair across from her, felt the warmth of the flames burning in the fireplace, watched the glow dance across the contours of my mother’s face.

I leaned forward, knees apart, resting my elbows on them as I touched my rough hands to one another. “Mom, do you think I would make a good leader?”

She said nothing. Closed the book in her hands and rested it in her lap. I looked at her. Watched her eyes flicker and whisper. “Why do you ask?”

My brows drew forward as I shifted my gaze back to my hands. Silent.

The fire popped. Crackled. Snapped.

“Did you know that when you were born, no one could tell you both apart?”

My hands stilled.

“When you were little, both your eyes were as green as fresh-cut grass. Absolutely identical in every way.”

I closed my eyes. Tipped my chin to my chest and swallowed.

“No one could tell you apart…except for me. I could always see the difference.”

I looked up. Heard the song of motherly love told by her hazel eyes.

“I could see that you both held spring meadows in your eyes, but unlike your brother, you were different. Because your brother’s eyes were like grass in the sunlight at noon. Such a light, vibrant green. But you…” Sh e paused.

I waited. Listened.

“Your eyes were like the fields at sunset, or spring grass capturing the rays of the morning sun.” She smiled. “And I knew your eyes would become mine.”

The corner of my lips pulled, but I struggled to hold the smile. I looked back at my hands.

“You’re not your brother, Wes. You never were. You’ve always been someone different. Someone uniquely you.”

I leaned back in the chair, gripping the arms for support. “I know I’m not him. But that’s who everyone wants me to be.” I set my gaze to the shadows. “But I’ll never be him.” Because he was so much better than I ever could be.

Silence.

Snap. Crackle. Pop.

Then my mother spoke again. “Chase had the potential to be a good leader, I think. But he always wanted nothing more than to pacify and appease your father. And in the end…” A pause. A sigh. A hesitation. “I fear he would have become just another version of Charles.”

I faced her once more. Her eyes fixed on me.

“Whenever the time comes, my darling, I think you’ll lead this region better than your predecessor.”

I grimaced.

“And…I think you’ll do it better than your brother ever could.”

My heart lightened. Just slightly. “Why?”

“Because you’re uniquely you, Wes. And you always follow your heart.”