KILLIAN

"What the fuck is this? Shitting on my parade day?”

I don’t pause at Nikolai’s voice on my way inside the

mansion. Instead, I reach the fridge and grab a bottle

of water.

He throws the nearest object he can find at me, a Zippo, and I

tilt my head to the side, letting it collide with the bottle of vodka.

It shatters against the counter in a ceremony of glass and liquor.

“I’m assuming you’ll clean it up and replace my vodka,” Jeremy

says from the bottom of the stairs, arms crossed.

“It’s my vodka. Fuck off.” My cousin shoves an ice pack on his

swollen jaw and props his foot on the edge of the sofa.

Leaning against the counter, I cross my legs at the ankle. “Bad

mood?”

“And you’re not? That loser won against you.”

I lift a shoulder. “I won something better than a meaningless

match.”

Like Glyndon’s company and even a temporary truce from

fighting me once she was watching those fireflies—and I wasn’t

touching her.

She eventually relaxed once I forced my hand to remain still.

Something that proved to be harder in practice than theory.

Turning this into a habit is out of the question. After all, I only

need her to get her guard down a little, let me in a little so I can

figure her all out and, in retrospect, delve into the reasons behind

my interest in her.

Am I ready to go the extra mile for that? Sure as fuck.

Considering the crease in her brows when I drove her back to

her dorm, I’d say I still have a ways to go.

She’s a stubborn, hotheaded little shit, and I’m here for every

fucking second of it.

Glyndon might be the solid, huge rock, but I’m water and

water might slam into the rock at first, but it’ll eventually break

through it.

“What’s better than winning, motherfucker?” Nikolai grunts.

“Next time, don’t take my fight if you’re going to lose it. My image

is at stake here, Satan’s heir.”

I pull out my pack of cigarettes and stare at it for a beat,

remembering Glyndon’s words from earlier about poison. Then I

shake my head and stuff one between my lips. “I assume you

won the one after?”

“Barely,” Jeremy answers on his behalf, then heads to the

minibar and pours himself a drink. “An art student nearly beat him

to death first.”

“Bullshit!” Nikolai jumps up and points his ice pack at Jeremy.

“I was only taking it easy on him at the beginning. And that bitch

is no ordinary art student. He obviously works out.”

I raise a brow and blow out a trail of smoke. “Superhuman art

student?”

“Maybe one of those comic book superheroes, huh?” Jeremy

prompts. “Posh rich boy by day and vigilante by night.”

“With a mask, a cape, and a bat car.”

“Maybe a suit, too?”

“Fuck you both simultaneously.” Nikolai flops back against the

sofa. “For your information, Landon was the reigning king in all

the championships he participated in AND he’s the current leader

of the Elites.”

Jeremy props an elbow on the counter beside me and takes a

sip of his drink. “Our Niko actually knows information like that?

Since when?”

“Since Gareth was whispering in my ear. And what the fuck? I

know all the information.”

“That implies you’ll use violence.”

“Of fucking course. Why would I need to fill my head with

other boring information?”

I tap the cigarette in the bottle of water, letting the ashes

tarnish the pure liquid. “Landon?”

“Landon King,” Nikolai offers. “Creighton’s cousin, or second

cousin, or what-the-fuck ever. I say if his bitch clone brother

hadn’t shown up out of thin air, he would’ve kept the fight going

all night long. That crazy motherfucker smiles when he’s beaten

up, like you, Satan’s heir.” He kicks the table, and it tumbles

down, all the glass shattering to minuscule pieces. “Let’s fight,

Killer. I still have energy to purge.”

“Pass.” Not only will he go for hours on end, but I’m also in a

good mood and don’t want to fight.

It’s not my preferred purging method, anyway.

“Control your temper.” Jeremy sits beside him and offers him

his drink. “It’s going to get you killed one day.”

“One day isn’t today.” He swallows the contents of the glass in

one go. “And it’s not temper, it’s energy, Jer. Goes all the way to

my dick. I should’ve gotten laid tonight.”

“So Landon and his twin brother ruined your night?” I circle

back to the topic at hand.

“Fuck those rich little boys, especially the dainty one who

looked no different from a lotus flower. He shared Landon’s looks

but had the aura of a weakling.”

“Not to mention, he stole your fun,” Jeremy points out and

Nikolai tsks.

“Stole your fun, how?”

“Well, cousin, as soon as that dainty lotus flower showed up,

Landon hiked up the aggression and went all in. But when he left,

Landon actually lost. Just like that. Talk about weird twin shit.”

He was probably scaring his brother.

Well, fuck.

Maybe Glyndon is right and her brother is on the spectrum. I

know Eli King is for sure. We met as kids through our parents, and

he was the only one who had a look that mirrored mine.

Irrevocably bored.

Now the question is whether to eliminate Landon or not. Let’s

wait and see if he forms an obstacle in my endeavors with

Glyndon first.

“I swear to fuck I’m done with twin fuckery after dealing with

Mia and Maya’s swapping shit. Speaking of my sisters, let me

make sure they’re in their dorms and not sneaking somewhere

and causing someone to lose their lives.” Nikolai fishes out his

phone and taps a message—probably to his bodyguards. Being

part of the Bratva gives both Jeremy and Nikolai special security

that even the campus can’t interfere with.

“Make sure to tighten security.” Jeremy’s brow furrows. “I

caught Anoushka sneaking around in the fight club with her new

friends.”

“Shouldn’t have let her go to the enemy’s territory,” Nikolai

says absentmindedly. “Now, she’ll start developing habits of

fraternizing with those posh kids.”

“Over my dead body.” Jeremy takes a long drink. “I don’t like

her friends. Especially that loud silver-haired one.”

“Cecily Knight,” I supply for him. “Her father owns an

investment corporation and her mother is some higher-up in social

services.”

“And you know all of this because?” Jeremy asks.

“I do my research about our neighbors. Besides, I told you

Aiden and Elsa King, Creighton and Eli’s parents, are friends with

my folks. And so are Cole and Silver Nash, Ava’s parents.”

Nikolai pulls the ice pack away from his face, revealing a

purple bruise near his temple. “How about fake lotus and

Landon’s parents?”

“Never met them. Heard of them, though. Their father has half

of the King fortune. The other half belongs to Aiden. Their mother

is a renowned artist.” I type her name in the search bar of my

phone and show them the sketch paintings of people, places, and

memories.

Nikolai whistles. “Don’t understand shit about art, but these

would look sick as tattoos.” He snatches the phone to stare at a

family picture taken at some opening of a gallery.

Levi holds Astrid by the waist as she smiles at the camera,

seeming happy, fulfilled, like Mom does whenever Gareth and I

show up to her charities.

Landon stands beside his mother, holding her shoulder.

Brandon is by his father’s side, grabbing Glyndon’s shoulder.

Among all of them, Landon’s smile is the fakest. No one would

discern it, not even his parents, but he’s putting on the most epic

show so that even he probably believes he’s happy to be there.

Been there, done that, have the pictures to prove it.

Glyn’s smile however is the saddest. She doesn’t want to

smile, looking a bit uncomfortable in her formal little dark blue

dress that matches her mother’s pantsuit.

She’s putting on a show but in a completely different way than

her brother. They’re both pretending to be happy, but she’s the

only one who’s feeling bad about it.

“Met them only once and I can tell this is the fake lotus.”

Nikolai taps Brandon’s face. “On closer inspection, he’s hot. Not

sure if I’d fuck him or his sister. Maybe both at the same time if

they’re not weirded out about seeing each other naked.”

I pull my phone from his hand and stalk to the stairs without a

word. Then fetch my Zippo and throw it in a flash. It hits Nikolai

on the side of his head—the injured side.

Good. I see my quarterback skills aren’t completely gone.

Nikolai slams a hand on his temple and howls, “What the fuck

was that for, you motherfucking fuck?”

Jeremy tips his head against the sofa and laughs, the sound

following after me as I reach the top of the stairs.

My steps are nonchalant, normal, but my body’s temperature

is not. Maybe I should beat Nikolai to the point that Aunt Rai

won’t recognize him next time she sees him.

Gareth’s door opens and he steps out holding the phone to his

face, a smile on his lips. “There he is.”

He comes to stand beside me, placing the phone in our direct

view. Mom and Dad are on the other end, looking to be in the

garden.

It’s around dusk there, and the sun makes its descent behind

them, giving them a picturesque background.

Reina Ellis is a beautiful blonde—the type you find on the

cover of magazines and wonder how the hell does she look to be

in her thirties when she’s in her late forties. She has a natural

shine in her blue eyes, one that neither Gareth nor I inherited.

My father, however, has a harder look, and it probably has to

do with his line of work and the big-fish-eats-little-fish mentality.

Let’s say time has treated Asher Carson well, too. He has sharp

features that both my brother and I got in our genes, and he

passed out his green eyes to Gareth. In a way, my brother is a

copy of him, both in looks and personality.

I’m the bleaker version of both of them.

The black sheep of the family.

An automatic smile pulls on my lips. “Hi, Mom. Looking great,

as usual.”

“Don’t give me that, you ungrateful son. You haven’t called me

in two days.”

“I’ve been busy with studies. You know how brutal med school

is. Besides”—I hold my brother by the shoulder—“I’m sure Gareth

tells you all about me.”

His smile remains in place and he doesn’t even stiffen. We

have an unspoken rule that we’re the perfect siblings in front of

our parents.

I break that rule if I feel like it, but Gareth never does.

He cares.

“I’m sure you’re busy, but check in occasionally.” She sighs. “I

miss your faces all the time. Will you come visit, Kill? I haven’t

seen you since the summer.”

“I’ll see how things go with school.”

“Make time and visit over the next holiday,” Dad tells me—no,

he informs me.

I counter the hostile energy with an even bigger smile. “Hi,

Dad. Do you miss me, too?”

I expect him to fall for the provocation, but he smiles while

stroking Mom’s shoulder. “Of course, I miss you, son. Your mom

and I would love to have you over with your brother next time.”

“I’ll make sure he comes along,” Gareth says like the golden

fucking boy he is.

“Wait a second.” Mom gets close to the camera, staring at me.

“Oh my God! Is that a cut on your lip? Killian Patrick Carson, did

you get into a fight?”

Mom’s habit of using my middle name when she’s upset is a

translation of her giver-of-life-and-name status.

I can’t help being amused by it every time.

Gareth goes rigid, completely blindsided, but by the time he

opens his mouth, I’m already grinning. “Unless making out is a

fight, I don’t think so?”

Her lips fall open. “Didn’t need that image.”

“You’re the one who asked, Mom. Besides, I’m at my prime.

You didn’t think I’d just be studying, right?”

“Tone it down,” Dad warns. He has a sixth sense of figuring

out when it’ll become too much for my mom and cuts it off. Over

time, I’ve started to develop that sense, too.

Only, I use it to push people to their limits. Not my mom.

Others.

That’s the only thing Dad and I agree on.

“Well, I guess that’s fine as long as you’re not getting into

trouble.” Her voice softens. “Take care of each other, boys, okay? I

love you.”

“Love you, too, Mom,” Gareth says.

“Love you, Mom,” I speak with the same level of sincerity as

my brother.

She hangs up with a huge smile on her face.

As soon as they’re gone, Gareth pushes away from me as if I

were the plague.

“Go easy on the disgust level, big bro. It makes you look

weak.”

He flips me off and stalks back to his room.

I head to mine and check my phone. Countless unread texts

and booty calls sit in my notifications. A few from annoying clingy

pests who don’t know how to simply pick up their dignity and

back off.

My feet come to a halt in the middle of the room as I scroll to

the photos from tonight.

Plural.

The first was from afar when I first saw Glyndon with Annika

and her friends. I watched her for exactly fifteen minutes before I

told Jeremy about his sister’s presence and got my opening to

approach her.

In the pictures I’ve taken, Glyndon is either listening or

laughing about something they said. She’s not the talker in that

group—or in her family—and it shows.

The other pictures were with the fireflies. I zoom in on her

face, then trail my finger down to where her hand is clenched on

her shorts.

I can almost smell raspberries and paint as I trace the

contours of her cheeks, neck, lips.

My thumb taps on her face and I can finally see what Devlin

loved about her, what he struggled with for her.

How he floundered and cried and begged on his fucking knees

for her.

Still, he didn’t fuck her.

She didn’t want to, is what she said.

Motherfucker got friend-zoned to death. Literally.

I’d feel sorry for him if I knew how. But since I don’t, I’m

completely fine with finishing what he couldn’t.