Chapter 3
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I am a monster.
Lukas
“You did not have to pinch my ear,” I mutter as Viktor frees me in a parlor several rooms down from the kitchen where we’ve taken our meals ever since we were kids.
Even though it was once a cold dark place, that kitchen and the family meals we now have in it are what I miss the most when I’m touring. Now that our parents no longer blacken the table with their exalted presence, there’s warmth. Love. Safety.
I cherish our evening meals almost as much as I dreaded them seven years ago while our parents were still alive and using them like business meetings to decide what to do next with their puppet sons.
Something about everyone sitting around a table laughing and talking over one another fills an aching place in my soul. Family dinner is beautiful chaos—and the beauty has doubled since I’ve been gone, leaving me to relearn the warmth all over again.
It’s remarkable.
People are so fluid. Constantly changing. Constantly growing. Constantly…alive.
I love seeing peoplebepeople. Embracing who they are without shame or guilt.
Even whenwho they areis an irritable prick like Viktor right now.
“Whaaat?” I drawl, crossing my arms over my chest. “Quit giving me that look.”
“What look?” he grumbles.
I flick my finger at his face. “Thatone. It’s alljudgy.”
“Forgive myjudgylook. I’m just trying to figure out where I went wrong or if it’s our parents’ fault that now two of my brothers have brought women home to treat like pets.”
Scoffing, I splay my fingers over the firebird painted across my chest. “You wound me. Clara isn’t apet. She’s a…” I wet my lips.Projectdoes me few favors, andtoydoes me fewer. So I say, “Person.”
“That pause was not comforting,” Viktor grouses.
I scoff. “Not all of us can be writers and know the words they’re trying to think of instantly, Viktor.”
“First of all, youarea writer. Second of all, tell me what’s going on.”
I sigh, forgoing my hubris. “If you must know…” I sink my fingers into my hair. “…I think Clara was being abused.”
Viktor’s expression hardens further, but the judgment leaves it. “How? Have you seen bruises?”
My head shakes. “No, nothing like that, as far as I can tell. But you’re going to think my reason is stupid.”
“Lukas.” Sincerity and care lace themselves into the way Viktor says my name. “You can tell me anything. I think we all know that abuse isn’t something to take lightly, no matter what form it comes in or how it presents itself.”
Well. Fine then. I give him my stupid truth, “It was in her eyes.”
Viktor’s mouth opens to tell me I’m an idiot, but he collects himself and shuts it before covering his face with his hand and deflating. “Lukas…”
“You’ll see it, too, if you look, Viktor. She’s terrified. She’s not said a word since she got here, to any of us. She tenses and flinches in response to everything. She’s perfectly obedient. Yousawhow she reacted when I snapped my fingers at her.Immediately on call. Ready to listen. Ready to please.” You don’t just become that kind of person. You aren’t just born as a slave to other people. That happens after you’re broken into pieces. That happens after you’ve been chained up and shocked whenever you try to fight the constraints.
Ihateit.
I hate seeing that pain in her beautiful gem-blue eyes.
I hate it…but I don’t. My fists crack at my sides as I fight the rush pouring through me and mutter, “In other words, she’s exactly my type.”
