Chapter 158 Torn Between Two Brothers

Chapter 158 Torn Between Two Brothers
Elara pov 

Seeing the blood on his hands, I hurried into his room, frowning slightly as I tried to carefully walk past the shattered pieces of glass scattered all over the floor.

“Victor, what did you do?” I asked in shock, staring around the room, which was a total mess.

Broken glass was everywhere, and there were things scattered across the floor as if something had happened in the room. My eyes immediately returned to his bloodied hands, and I felt a strange sense of worry.

A cold chuckle escaped his lips.

“Why do you care? And why are you here?”

I stared at him, puzzled by his words. Why did I care? Wasn't he tired of being rude to me every time we spoke?

“I heard someone calling my name, and then I heard the noise coming from your room,” I explained, glancing at the broken glass. “That's why I came to check what happened.”

Victor didn't respond.

I sighed, already feeling irritated by his attitude.

“Well, what happened? If you don't want to tell me what happened and want to continue being mean, then I'm leaving now,” I said, turning on my heels.

“You caused this situation.”

I stopped immediately.

Slowly, I turned back toward him, my eyebrows drawing together in confusion.

“What?”

Victor stared at me, his expression difficult to read.

“You caused this,” he repeated.

I looked around the room and then back at him, completely confused.

What was he talking about?

“How did I cause this?” I asked, my voice softer now as I tried to understand what he meant.

He didn't answer.

I stood there, staring at him, wondering what could possibly have happened between us for him to blame me for the state of his room.

I hadn't done anything to him.

At least, not that I knew of.

He suddenly walked toward me, his expression still difficult to read.

“Well, congratulations on becoming the future Luna,” he said.

I folded my arms across my chest, staring at him in disbelief.

“Why didn't you congratulate me earlier in the courtroom?” I asked curiously.

Victor didn't answer.

He simply stood there, his eyes fixed on me, and the silence between us became uncomfortable.

But that wasn't what mattered to me anymore.

I still couldn't get his earlier words out of my head. He had said that I was the reason for what had happened to him, and I needed to understand what he meant.

I turned fully toward him.

“That aside, what did you mean earlier when you said I caused what happened to you?”

His expression changed slightly, but he still didn't answer.

I waited, watching him closely.

“What did I do, Victor?” I asked again, my voice softer this time.

I couldn't understand why he was blaming me, and the uncertainty was beginning to bother me.

“I need you to tell me what you meant.”

Now I was confused and scared at the same time because I genuinely didn't understand what he meant.

“I have always liked you, Elara.”

I froze.

I didn't even know how to respond to what he had just said. The moment those words left his mouth, my mind went completely blank.

Everything around me suddenly became quiet.

I blinked several times, trying to process what I had just heard. Was this really coming from Victor's mouth, or was there another side of him I had never seen before?

My brain refused to cooperate.

Victor had always been difficult with me. Most of the time, he acted as though he couldn't stand being around me, so hearing him say that he had always liked me felt completely unexpected.

“I don't understand what you're trying to say,” I said, staring at him in confusion. “What do you mean?”

I asked again, hoping he would explain himself because I couldn't make sense of his confession.

Instead, he walked toward me.

I instinctively took a small step back, but before I could move any further, he reached for me and surprisingly took both of my hands in his.

My eyes widened immediately.

His palms were warm against mine, despite the small cuts on his hands, and I could feel the slight tremble in his fingers.

I stared at our joined hands before slowly lifting my gaze to his face.

Victor was looking directly at me.

There was no teasing smile on his lips this time, no trace of the usual arrogance I had grown accustomed to seeing whenever we spoke. He looked serious, almost nervous, and that somehow made his words feel even more real.

“I've always liked you,” he repeated, his voice quieter than before. “I just never told you.”

My heart began beating faster.

Maybe I was just too shocked by everything he had said, because the next thing I knew, I burst into laughter.

“Come on, Victor, what are you trying to say?” I asked, looking at him, but the expression on his face made it clear that he wasn't joking.

I slowly removed my hands from his and stared at him in confusion.

“You have always hated me. You bullied me, annoyed me, and acted like you couldn't stand being around me. So what exactly are you trying to say now? I honestly don't understand. You're just confusing me.”

Victor lowered his gaze for a moment before looking back at me.

“I did all of that because I couldn't understand my feelings,” he admitted. “I thought if I kept telling myself that I didn't like you and acted arrogant toward you, eventually, I would stop feeling anything for you. I thought I could force myself not to like you, but it only made things worse. The more I tried to push you away, the more I found myself drawn to you.”

His voice was quieter now, and there was nothing playful about his expression.

That was when I finally realized that this wasn't some strange joke or another one of Victor's attempts to annoy me.

Victor was actually confessing his feelings to me.

“What?” I whispered, completely caught off guard. “I-I... how did this even happen?”

“I've always liked you, Elara,” he said. “I've just never been able to tell you. I didn't know how to deal with it, so I acted like I hated you instead. But seeing you close to my brother...”

He paused, running a hand through his hair.

“It drives me insane.”

I didn't know what to say.

For a few seconds, I simply stood there, staring at him while I tried to process everything. Victor was the last person I ever expected to hear those words from. If someone had told me months ago that he secretly had feelings for me, I would have laughed at them.

“I... I don't actually know what to say,” I finally admitted. “But I'm already with your brother, Victor, and I love your brother so much.”

I watched his face carefully as I said it, almost expecting him to become angry.

Instead, he simply nodded.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I know.”

His eyes dropped to his injured hand.

“That is why I let out my frustration by hitting my hand against the wall.”

I stared at him before shaking my head.

“That's ridiculous,” I said. “You shouldn't be hurting yourself because of this. Let me clean up your wound.”

He didn't argue with me.

I took him over to sit down, then went to get the first-aid box. When I returned, I sat beside him and carefully took his injured hand.

The cut wasn't too deep, but there was still blood around his knuckles. I cleaned the wound and applied some antiseptic before wrapping a bandage around his hand.

Throughout the entire time, I could feel his eyes on me.

I tried not to look at him too much because I didn't know what I was supposed to say after his confession. Everything felt different now. The same person who had spent so much time irritating me was sitting quietly while I bandaged his hand because he had hurt himself over feelings he had apparently been hiding for a long time.