Page 23 of When Hearts Unravel (The Orchid #6)

“Stupid twins. Like they’re so special,” I mutter, hugging my notebook to my chest.

A hot feeling burns in my belly. I want to sneak into their rooms and draw on their walls. Rip up their books. Make a mess.

But then I remember what Mom said before.

Tell a story. Make it fun. Maybe I can cook with her later if she isn’t busy.

Pain carves into my chest and I flinch. I want to escape, but I can’t move my arms and legs.

It’s happening again—the nightly torture of horrid memories parading behind my eyelids when I fall asleep.

Darkness suffocates me, and a scream gurgles in my throat.

Nothing comes out—no sound, no movements. I’m locked in.

Stop it, Rex. Stop it before it’s too late.

Sweat sticks to my forehead, but the images fire at me like bullets from a machine gun.

The Persian carpet sweeps into my vision again, the clinking of marbles striking against the wall as crisp as if it happened yesterday.

“You’re not a twin. You can’t play with us.” I mimic Ryland’s voice, my tummy clenching. “Meanie.”

A story! Tell a story.

I toss a red marble at the wall, over and over. Sitting on the top step of the big staircase at home, I try to think of a new story. Something fun, something to do with cooking. Mom will like that.

The marble pings then plops on the carpeted floor before rolling down the stairs to the first floor.

Thud. Thud. Thud. Like dominos.

I open my notebook and write with my blue crayon.

There once was a big red dragon who loved to eat little boys…like twins.

I grin, my heart galloping. That’s so mean, Rex.

I pull out a new marble, then another, and throw them down the stairs. The colors of the marbles are part of my story, which is about twins being cooked into a stew along with broccoli and beets because those veggies are gross.

A door bangs in the distance. I jump. I hate loud noises. Two voices—a man and a woman. Mom? They sound…mad?

My heart vaults to my throat, my pulse a hurricane in my ears, but I’m still trapped in the straitjacket of my sleep. Stop them, Rex. Move. Stop playing with your damn marbles.

I’m in the scene and yet, I’m vaguely aware it isn’t reality.

Then the vortex sucks me back in.

My clothes are dripping wet as I run back indoors. It started drizzling the moment I ran outside to get away from the noise, the yelling.

Grinning, I hold the slippery frog in my hands. The twins will get a nice surprise when they go to their bedroom later.

I barely notice the drip, drip, drip of the water from my hair landing on the hardwood floor, or the clumps of mud I’m tracking inside. Morris, our butler, or Agnes, our housekeeper, will shake their heads and say, “Mr. Rex, play indoors when it’s raining.”

It’s the creepy silence I notice first. I hear nothing other than the pitter-patter of the rain.

Goosebumps form on my arms, and the little brown frog jumps out of my hands.

“Hey! Come back here!” I chase after it but nearly trip and fall when I see it.

A pair of feet sticking out from the foot of the staircase.

I slowly inch forward.

Then the orange dress with the small penguins Mom loves because Dad got it for her last week for her birthday.

Then her pale arms, her neck, her face, her dark hair.

All twisted in weird angles.

“Mom!” I scream, and run as fast as my short legs can carry me.

Tears wet my face when I finally reach her, because I know something is wrong.

Very, very wrong.

I grab her shoulders and shake her. “Mom! Mommy! You okay?”

But all I see are blank eyes staring at the ceiling.

“Mommy!”

She doesn’t answer me.

And around her, red and blue marbles are scattered over the floor and the stairs.

My marbles.

I gasp as I bolt up, finding myself on the floor of the foyer, sweat dripping over my forehead.

Fuck. Again. Another blackout. Something sharp pokes my hand and I look down and choke out an exhale.

A knife. I’m holding a kitchen knife. Why the hell am I in the foyer with a kitchen knife?

I quickly stand, my hand trembling as I set the knife on the nearest table and stumble back into my bedroom.

Mindlessly, I reach for the bottle of Velowake on my nightstand, uncap it, and shove a few pills into my mouth.

I can’t let myself fall asleep. I can’t do this—the blackouts, the nightmares.

Reliving one of the worst days of my life night after night, remembering in stark clarity her dead eyes, her cold body, the blood pooling on the ground. The split second of elation when I held the frog morphing into utter terror.

And finally, seeing the marbles on the ground. My marbles. The ones I didn’t put away before I ran outside, notebook tossed aside, angry at the twins, wanting my petty revenge on them.

It’s macabre. It’s torture even the guards at Guantanamo Bay can’t come up with.

For almost thirty years, we thought she had slipped on my marbles and tumbled down the stairs, her neck snapping upon landing.

It was the curse of the eldest son when he fell in love with his wife.

The woman would die within one year of his confessing his love to her.

After all, this had happened for generations.

My family never questioned it. Dad was racked with guilt because he fell in love with Mom, his arranged wife, years after they got married.

Then, a little over two years ago, Maxwell was a mess because he was falling in love with Belle, his wife from a similar arranged marriage.

When strange things started happening to her, he spent every ounce of energy trying to defeat said curse.

Ultimately, he unraveled everything and caught the culprit behind the generations of deaths.

“It’s not your fault, Rex. We never blamed you, but this makes it official,” Maxwell told me back then.

I laughed it off, saying I knew that. How could anyone blame a six-year-old who forgot to clean up after himself, the same little kid who found his mother’s dead body later on?

But that was a lie. I did blame myself. For years.

It’s hard not to when you have a near-photographic memory and relive that night constantly, processing it as an older kid, a teenager, an adult, each time seeing the scene more vividly, each time thinking you can stop it from happening.

A million fruitless attempts at changing the past, the nightmares so real in my mind, I thought I was a little kid again.

I reach for the marble on my nightstand. A reminder of the day that changed my life.

The same day awaits me every night after I go to sleep.

Tossing the glass ball in my palm, I remember the months following Mom’s death, how life was sucked out of the Anderson Estate.

Something in the house other than my mother died that day.

Laughter, music, innocence, carefree happiness.

You don’t erase that type of guilt from your conscience with the snap of your fingers.

Especially when there’s still a part of that day no one knows about, something I’ve kept inside all this time, unwilling to share.

Because…guilt, and punishment. I don’t want anyone to console me.

I don’t deserve it.

God, Olivia would have a field day with my messed up mind.

Her pretty face appears behind my eyelids—eyes the color of freshly brewed tea, pools I can drown myself in, the elegant slope of her neck, the delicate frame of her body.

I grab my phone and swipe to my email to see if the investigator has any updates on the camera search, but there aren’t any.

He said it may take months to track down.

Then I swipe to my secret album with her images.

The wonder on her face when she pressed her nose against the car window, eagerness rolling off her when we first arrived in Mykonos.

The lonely silhouette of her standing by the cruise ship at the port, camera in her hand, wind rustling her dress. The world moved around her, but she was still. So still, like a sturdy, reassuring lighthouse standing up against a storm.

The devious smirk on her face when she left me speechless on the sun deck, my cock digging out of my pants, because she got in the last word in our little spat.

I smile at the photos, heat spreading through my chest.

For a moment, I forget about the terrible memories, and I can finally breathe.

No. You don’t deserve a break, not until you atone for the deaths, if that’ll ever happen. Heck, you woke up with a fucking knife in your hand and you don’t even know how it got there. You’re trying to drag her into hell with you.

Disgusted with myself, I toss my phone on the bed.

I bury my face between my knees, my hands shaking, when I smell it—the faint moisture, the damp earth, the brine reminding me so much of that night.

Clambering off the bed, I struggle to stay upright before striding to the windows and throwing open the curtains.

Limestone cliffs dotted with muted green loom in the distance.

White buildings with terracotta roofs pepper the landscape.

A faint mist clings to the shoreline, cloaking the city in a ghostly fog.

Thick clouds hang overhead, the dim daylight telling me it’s very early in the morning and the rest of the world is still asleep.

Dubrovnik, Croatia. Otherwise known as “The Pearl of the Adriatic.”

The historic city calls to me, and I know I need to get off the cruise, away from the crowds, to take a break from everything before Lana and Elias board the ship tonight, after which I won’t have a moment of peace.

I need to lose myself in an ancient city that has seen natural disasters and wars, and yet remains standing.

Maybe I’ll withstand it all too.

Two hours later, after a violent match against a punching bag in the gym, my healing knuckles bloodied again, I take a quick shower and bandage my fresh wounds.

With my navy cap low on my forehead and my eyes hidden behind my aviator sunglasses, I hope I can avoid detection today—from Greg Masters, fawning women, everyone and anyone waiting for the Anderson screwup to fail.

I straighten the sleeves of my black shirt and smooth my damp palms over my dark jeans.

Unassuming. A stranger. Not Rex-a-Million.

Run away. The voice chants in my head. What if I just ran away from it all? Disappeared off the boat today, never to resurface?

But my family. I can’t bring more sadness to them, after I caused so much of it. Heck, that’s why I became the jokester. To make them laugh. To give them some joy back.

I scoff. Some jokester I am. They aren’t laughing these days.

I shake my head at the nonsense and pull out my phone, needing to do one more thing before I escape.

Rex

Busy today with appointments. You staying on the boat, right?

Elias told her to remain aboard. Can’t take any chances with The Association still out there.

Her response comes back a minute later.

Bree

Yep. Don’t worry about me. I might do some reading. Do your thing. I’ll be fine.

Satisfied with her response—Bree isn’t the extroverted, adventurous type to begin with, and we have the best security team on board—I jam my phone back into my pocket and slip out of the stateroom.

My footfalls are quiet, my head dipped low as I pass by passengers staggering out of their rooms, bleary-eyed and clearly in search of strong coffee. Room service staff roll carts filled with silver-dome-covered plates, the smell of poached eggs and bacon wafting through the air.

I hasten my steps, eager to get to deck three to disembark, when a large shadow falls in front of me before I enter the nearest stairwell.

“Excuse me,” I mutter, pulling the bill of my cap lower.

The shadow doesn’t move.

Fucking asshole. I pivot to the right, not bothering to look up, and the shadow moves with me.

Then I step to the left, and the fucker does the same.

My already thin patience runs empty, and just as I’m about to give the person in front of me a piece of my mind—

“This looks much worse than I thought.”

Then comes the sound of the damn lighter.

Fucking Elias Kent.