by E. K. Blair
“Now?”
“Now.”
He gets up and steps to his laptop next to my unloaded pistol. I follow, and when he sits in the desk chair, I stand over his shoulder. I watch as he bypasses the Internet and accesses the deep web through Tor, which is an anonymity network that insures nothing he does will be indexed.
In a few quick swipes of the keyboard, numbers and codes begin to filter in. “There you go,” he says and then points to the screen, explaining, “This column lists the country codes, this one here lists account and routing numbers, and this column here is—”
“Close it down.”
He looks at me in confusion but does as I instruct and proceeds to logoff. I’m satisfied that without the threat of force, he handed over all the information without an inkling of hesitation.
“I don’t want his money. You can do whatever you want with it.”
Lachlan closes the lid to his laptop, picks up the gun, takes one bullet from the floor, and slides it into one of the cylinders. He then gives it a spin before locking it into place.
“Here,” he says in an even tone as he hands me the gun. “I’d take a bullet for Elizabeth. You on the other hand . . . I need to come down from you shoving that muzzle into my head, but I’d take a bullet for you as well. You want me to prove my loyalty to you?” He takes a couple steps back. “Pull the trigger.”
A sane man would take his word for it, but the gesture isn’t enough for me, not after everything that has compromised my life and Elizabeth’s. She’s much too precious to take anyone’s word at face value. So I stretch my arm out in front of me, but with a slight adjustment, one that Lachlan won’t be able to detect, I mark his right arm as my target.
He offered this test of integrity, and when I cock back the hammer, I slip my finger over the trigger, and follow through.
I squeeze and fire, but all that sounds is the snick from the chamber rounding.
Lachlan’s face drops, stunned that I pulled the trigger and then relieved when he realizes his game of Russian roulette just played out in his favor. He falls back into the chair as I holster my gun. And now that I have the confirmation that the only reason he withheld information from me was to fuck over Camilla and my father, I turn and walk to the door.
“Stop by later this afternoon. Elizabeth would enjoy seeing you now that we’re back,” I say without turning around.
And then I leave.
ELIZABETH IS STILL in bed sleeping when I get home from a long day of meetings. It’s been days of the same. She’s heartbroken and trying to cope with losing her father for the second time in her life, so I haven’t wanted to push her too much. I’m worried though. She’s been living in shades of darkness since we returned from the States. It’s more than the moping around that concerns me though. After my talk with Lachlan the other day, I came home and heard her voice coming from the bedroom. But she was in there alone. When I opened the door, I could tell she had been crying, so I decided not to question her.
I have to remind myself how fragile she still is. It wasn’t that long ago when she completely broke down after she found out about her mother and had to be medicated. She’s experienced only a handful of episodes since that night, but none that measure in magnitude.
Walking over to the edge of the bed, I watch her as she sleeps peacefully. Her face is soft and her breathing is steady. I run the backs of my fingers along her cheek, feeling her smooth skin warm against mine. I can finally look at her without the past fueling my hate for her. No longer do I want to cause her pain and suffering. No longer do I want to punish her.
Seeing her with her father helped stitch the wounds she inflicted with her deceitful ways. For the first time, I saw through all the walls she’s spent her whole life building and into the very core of who she is. Watching her with him, hearing their stories, and learning about who she was as a little girl suddenly made her transparent, and I could finally see the purity and softness that’s shrouded beneath years that have hardened her.
I let her sleep while I go into the closet to hang up my suit jacket, and when I go into the bathroom to splash my face with cold water, I realize I forgot to grab a hand towel. Turning off the faucet, I walk into the toilet room and pull a towel from the linen cabinet. That’s when I look down and notice something sitting in the bottom of the toilet bowl. I flick the light on to find it’s a tiny blue pill, half-dissolved in the water.
I go to her sink top and pick up her prescription bottle to confirm it’s the same pill.
She’s been lying to me.
I have to wonder why she’d flush the pill instead of taking it because she needs to be taking them every day.
Going back in the bedroom, I sit on the edge of the bed where she’s still sleeping. The dip of the mattress beneath me causes her to stir awake. Her eyes flutter open, and I handle her delicately. “You’ve been sleeping long?”
She looks at the clock on the bedside table and responds, “Not too long. How was your day?”
“Busy. What about yours?”
She sighs when she sits up and leans back again the headboard. “Same as the day before.”
“Did you remember to take your pill today?”
“Yes,” she answers with a curious look on her face. “Why?”
“You know how important it is that you take them every day, don’t you?”
Annoyance paints her eyes. “Yes, Declan. I know. Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I want you taking care of yourself.”
“I am.”
“Then tell me why your pill is in the bottom of the toilet.”
Her eyes tick, widening for a fleeting second, but I catch it.
“Do you want to explain to me why?”
Her throat constricts when she takes a hard swallow, and she shakes her head slowly. She’s scared.
“How long have you been doing this?”
“I can take care of myself. I don’t need you parenting me,” she snaps.
I harden my voice, demanding, “How long?”
“I’m fine. I don’t need them.”
“How long, Elizabeth?”
She takes a deep breath, steadying herself to take me on when she admits, “Since I got them.”
My teeth grit in an attempt to temper my anger, and when she notices my mood shift, she tries coaxing me. “Declan, I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine.”
“I am.”
“I heard you talking to someone the other night, but nobody was here,” I say, calling her out.
“What are you talking about?”
I stand and pace back a few steps as my irritation grows. “You were in this room with the door closed. You were talking to someone. Who was it? And don’t you dare feed me a lie.”
Her eyes dart to the corner of the room, and when I look over to the window where she’s focusing, the truth hits me.
Pike.
I turn back and take a few steps towards her. “What are you looking at?”
Her eyes, now rimming with tears, shift back to me.
“I need you to talk to me,” I plead as I sit back down on the bed next to her. “Is it your brother? Are you seeing him again?”
“Don’t lie to him.”
I’m completely caught. He’s going to run now that he knows I’m crazy and that I’ve been lying to him. Panic pangs through my body as Declan stares at me.
“Trust me, Elizabeth. Trust me enough to tell me.”
He scoops my hands into his, and I can see the worry pouring out of him.
“Is that who you’re looking at? Is he here?”
I close my eyes, scared of what his reaction will be, but I can’t hide from the truth he now knows. My hands tremble in his when I finally nod my head yes.
“He’s here?”
I nod again, and when I get the courage to open my eyes, I confess, “I need him.”
“Baby,” he breathes, cupping my cheek with his one hand. “You can’t do this to yours
elf. It’s not healthy, and I need you healthy.”
“But . . . he’s my brother.”
“He’s dead.”
I blink and the tears fall. “I know that. But I still need him.”
“Need me more.”
His words expose an insecurity I wasn’t aware of. I look into his eyes—really look—and I see what I’ve never seen before—self-doubt. The green in his eyes brightens in vibrancy, the effect of unshed tears that threaten to fall.
“I do need you,” I tell him.
“It’s not enough.”
“Don’t you dare choose me over him.”
I turn back to Pike as Declan keeps his eyes on me.
“This has to end, Elizabeth. You have to start taking your pills. I need you well.”
I don’t look at him when he says this, instead I stay focused on Pike as my tears fall.
“He’s right.”
“No.”
Pike walks over to me and crawls onto the bed, sitting on the other side of me, across from Declan.
“No!” I repeat fervently as I feel the fibers of my soul shredding apart.
“You can’t keep hanging on to me like this.”
“But I need you.”
“I can’t let you do this to yourself anymore,” Declan says, and when I look back to him, I cry, “But I need him.”
“And I need you. You have to let him go,” he insists. “You have to take your pills and get better.”
I turn to Pike again, and when I do, Declan adds on a severed voice, “As much as you need him, I need you more.”
“I don’t want to lose you, Pike.”
“It’ll be okay.”
“It’s not okay. None of this is okay.”
“It’s time to let me go.”
His request burns pieces of my heart into ash. I can feel it—scorching hot and blistering inside me, and I can’t seem to cry hard enough to temper the flames. How do I let go when I don’t know a day of survival without him?
“Don’t leave me!” I sob frantically.
“Baby, this is killing me to see you like this,” Declan says, breaking by my side.
“Say goodbye to me, Elizabeth.”
My face crumples as the agony of losing my brother for good strangles my heart, paralyzing the ventricles. Tears force their way down my cheeks, cutting me like shards of ice.
“Don’t leave me.”
“You’re the best sister anyone could ever have, and I was so lucky that you were mine.”
“Don’t you dare say your goodbyes, Pike.”
“Look at Declan. Look at what we’re doing to him.”
I turn to my other side and see Declan’s head in his one hand while his other is holding on to me, and he’s crying.
Oh, my God, he’s crying.
“Declan, please don’t cr—”
“I need you,” he beseeches desperately.
“We can’t continue this.”
I watch as tears fall down Declan’s face, and it’s a punch to my gut to see how much pain he’s in. A man who never cracks is now crumbling before me—because of me. Every tear of his is a fissure in my breaking heart, cutting its way deeper into the delicate tissues.
I can’t do this to him.
I love Pike. He’s sacrificed himself again and again, my whole life, just to protect me, and no words exist to express how much he means to me. But now it’s my turn to protect. And it’s Declan that I need to take care of, because I need him strong so he can care for me in return.
As much as this kills me, I dig deep inside all my rotted wounds to grab on to the strength I need to say goodbye. “I never would’ve survived this world without you, Pike.”
“But you did survive. And you’re going to be okay without me.”
“I love you.”
“I need you to promise me that you’ll listen to Declan, that you’ll start taking your pills and get yourself healthy.”
He’s adamant, and I give him my word through the strain of my throat. “I promise.”
I watch as his solid form ghosts into opacity, and I cry harder.
“I love you.”
“Pike!”
Opacity transfuses into a cloudiness.
“I’m going to miss you.”
“I’m gonna miss you too.”
Cloudiness disappears into nothingness.
And when the lingering vapors of his scent fade away, I fall into Declan.
“He’s gone,” I wail amidst the trauma of freshly crenelated wounds that bleed inside me.
“I’m going to take care of you. I need you to believe in me.”
“I do believe in you. It just hurts to let go of him.”
“Look at me,” he demands, and when I do, his face is streaked in tears shed. “I love you to the point it hurts, but I relish the pain of it because it reminds me that what we have runs so deep within me. And I swear to you, I will never stop loving you.”
I wipe the trail of tears from his face.
“Tell me it hurts you to love me too.”
Bracing my hands along his jaw to feel his stubble against my palms, I give him the purest part of me. “There’s nobody in this world I could possibly hurt for more. Pike helped me survive, but it’s you who helps me live. I was never able to do that until you.”
And in the madness of heartache and profound love, Declan takes me as his, holding me, fucking me, healing me. Tears never stop falling from my swollen eyes as I open my heart and allow Declan the freedom to climb inside and take full ownership of all that I’m made of.
I no longer know where I end and he begins as we cement the amorphous lines between us.
We’re serpents who feed off one another for sole survivorship.
We’re everything love is meant to be.
TEARS CRYSTALIZE INTO salts, salts flake into dust, and dust gets swept away into the endless sky. And in the end we are left with a choice: swim or drown. The right choice is often the hardest. Drowning is so easy to do and takes no effort—you simply go weak and float deeper in the despair that consumes. But Pike wouldn’t want that for me, and I need to fight for Declan.
So I took my love’s hand and started to kick, trusting that together I would find my way to the surface. That was two weeks ago, and today I feel hopeful.
It was four days ago that I laughed for the first time since I said goodbye to my brother. A part of me thought I’d never laugh again, but I did, and oddly, it was Davina that pulled it out of me. Declan thought it would be good to have her over for dinner. He didn’t tell her anything we had been dealing with, but she knew something was wrong when I walked into the living room a disheveled mess. One would think a guest would be somewhat reserved, but not Davina. She called me out, telling me I looked like shit. It wasn’t just her crass honesty, it was the appalling look on her face and in her tone of voice, which she somehow managed to deliver in a caring way.
And I laughed.
That was all it took.
For a couple weeks Declan has postponed all his meetings and has given Lachlan time off. Declan and I need this time for us to be together and to mend. I feel myself healing little by little.
Declan has been showing me around the city. We’ve dined everywhere from The Tipperary to the Michelin-awarded Le Gavroche. I fed the ducks at St. James Park, and Declan couldn’t hold in his laughter when two geese started chasing after me. The next day, we opted for Hyde Park where we were able to lay under the sun, wrapped in each other’s arms. We kissed and talked for hours that afternoon. And then there was the London Eye. Despite my fear of heights and Ferris wheels, I threw caution to the wind and got on. Although I never got off the bench in the center of the glass capsule, Declan appreciated my effort.
We’ve been desperate for this time together, and now that we have it, we want more.
“If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go?” Declan asks as we lie in bed, bodies naked and sticky with the smell of our sex in the air.
“Back to Brunswickhill.”
“Of all places, you choose our home in Scotland?”
“I love it there.”
Running his fingers lazily through my hair, he comments, “You love it that much?”
With my head tucked under his chin, I nod and then kiss his neck as I drape my leg over his hip. Declan grabs my ass and pulls me closer to him, forcing my pussy to grind against his hardening cock. Eager for him to fill me again, I reach down, take him in my hand, and guide him inside of me.
“Fuck me, baby,” he growls in need, and when he rolls onto his back, I reach my hands behind me to grab his thighs. Opening my body up to him even more in this position, I fuck him as his hands touch every part of me—caressing, squeezing, pinching. He drives me wild, making me cum all over him, the whole time reaffirming my place in his world—in his heart.
“Let’s go there,” he says in a heavy breath as our hearts slow.
“Where?”
“Your fairytale castle.” He gives me a sexy smirk, and I release a soft laugh when excitement swells at the thought of going back to Scotland.
Something happens to me physically as we drive through the gates of Brunswickhill. I can’t fully explain it, but maybe this is what home feels like. It’s just the two of us, hand in hand, and for the first time in a very long time, my heart doesn’t feel so heavy.
When we get to the top of the winding drive, I hop out of the car, drop my head back, take in a deep breath, and smile.
“What are you doing?”
Declan wraps his arms around my waist, pulling me in close, and with my lips still painted in joy, I tell him, “It feels good to be back.”
“This house is your home now.”
“I’ve never had this before. I’ve never known home until right now—right here with you.”
“It’s a first for me too, darling, but I wouldn’t want this with anyone but you.”
His lips land on mine, taking me in a claiming kiss as my hands get lost in his hair. I taste his happiness when he dips his tongue inside my mouth and glides it along mine. This foreign feeling that swirls inside me takes me over and laughter slips out. He doesn’t stop dropping kisses on me though, and it’s only a matter of seconds when he begins to laugh too.