Oliver would’ve been easier to deal with. My twin has far more power and influence, and he can bring the empire to ruin around us, just to prove he can.
If Mathew is behind this, you’re all fucked.
“I’m sorry.” Oliver hangs his head. “I know it won’t change anything, but for what it’s worth, I am sorry. It wasn’t supposed to get this far. I just wanted to go back to my life.”
“So, you wanted to turn on Mathew, and he did it first?” I shake my head.
“Yes. When I found out about the attack, I knew I had to do what I could to stop all of this.”
I want to believe Oliver, for our mother’s sake, at least. But too much has happened, and there have been too many hits for me to take him at face value.
A part of me wants Mathew to be the culprit and for Oliver to be the innocent one, if only so the world can make sense again.
Is that Mason Payne talking, or the man who’s going to be a father?
Because fuck it all if I don’t want to believe something good can survive amid all this darkness.
I take my knife out and hold it up to his neck. “I should cut you open and leave you to bleed out for what you did.”
Oliver holds still. “You could.”
“You still betrayed me,” I hiss. “Having a change of heart doesn’t change that.”
“I know.”
With a grunt of disgust, I release him. “If I find out you’re lying to me, you’ll wish I had sliced you open.”
I pick up the gag, turn back around, stuff it into his mouth, and leave the basement.
London is standing by the window when I turn the knob to our room.
She jumps up when I walk in, then gives me a smile. “Are you okay?”
“Mathew has Oliver tied up in the basement.” I lean in to run my mouth along her neck. “He knows Oliver betrayed us.”
London’s hands move down my back and pause at my behind. “Isn’t that a good thing?”
I move my mouth up to her ear and rub myself against her. “Oliver insists that Mathew betrayed us, and that Oliver only helped him because he wanted to end the war.”
“So they’re both guilty?”
“Yes, but that’s not the worst part. Oliver says he wanted to come clean, but Mathew sold him out before he could.”
“Mathew framed Oliver?” London draws back to look at me with a half-smile.
One of my hands moves under her shirt, the other keeps her arms pinned over her head. “That’s what he said.”
London’s breath quickens as she drops a hand between us to touch me. “You believe him.”
“I think he’s telling the truth. Or at least part of it.”
London’s hand moves to my pants. She pretends to fumble with the button there. “This is bad, isn’t it?”
I unhook her bra and move to the buttons of her shirt. “It’s much worse than we thought.”
“What are we going to do?”
I attach my lips to her neck again and press hot, open-mouthed kisses there. “For now, we have to be careful where we speak and who we talk to.”
