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“Yep, we grew up in the same orphanage.”
“That’s it. Time to go,” Lycus snarled at him, gripping his arm before hauling Kalen up.
“Stop, Lye,” Kalen said, trying to shake off his grip.
“No, she doesn’t deserve to know anything about us. If she wanted to know about us, she shouldn’t have run like a damn coward,” Lycus told him, shoving him toward his bedroom door.
“I will see you later, Aleera,” Kalen said, smiling sadly before looking at his mate. I nodded, watching Lycus all but drag Kalen from the room.
“I ran because Darius killed my parents. Did you expect me to come running into your arms and pretend he didn’t? I saw him burn my house with them in it to the damn ground,” I snapped angrily, and Lycus stopped.
“If that is why you left, then you are a bigger idiot than I thought. Darius didn’t kill your parents, Aleera,” Lycus growled at me before taking a step forward. He stopped, and his eyes flickered with anger.
“You would know that if you bothered to fucking ask, instead of nearly killing us all,” Lycus spat at me.
“I saw him. I know what I saw.”
“Then what you saw was wrong. Darius and Tobias didn’t murder your parents, Aleera.”
“What are you talking about? Tobias wasn’t even there,” I argued.
“Who do you think dragged you out? So, if that is why you ran, then you deserve everything they do to you.”
“Lycus!” Kalen murmured behind him, and Lycus growled before turning on his heel and shoving Kalen out of the bathroom. He then slammed the door so hard it made me jump.
Chapter 17
Darius
Lycus was in aterrible mood when I came up to the room. Pushing the door open, Lycus was yelling at Kalen, which was rare; he tried never to raise his voice around Kalen. We all knew how fragile he was. We had all had to pull him back from the brink at some point, yet walking in, I had no doubt that Aleera was the reason.
“What’s going on?” I asked, opening the door and shrugging off my jacket. I tossed it over the back of the chair by the fire. They were both glaring at each other, yet neither answered.
“This has something to do with Aleera?”
“Who else? She needs to go,” Lycus snapped at me, finally turning away from Kalen.
“What is this about? What did she do?”
“She did nothing. Lycus is the problem,” Kalen said before storming toward the door.
“Where are you going?” I asked him.
“Out.”
“Kalen!” I growled at him, and he stopped with his hand on the door handle.
“No, Darius. We are mates. You don’t get to control all of us.”
“If it is to do with your safety, I do. You leave this room before I know what is going on, I will have her placed back in the cells. Now sit your ass down,” I growled at him. Kalen’s knuckles turned white on the door handle, where he gripped it before he slammed the door. I raised an eyebrow at his anger.
I watched as he went and lay on our custom-made bed. Finding a bed that fit four men was impossible, so we made one. Lycus watched him and moved to the couch by the fireplace. Despite his anger, Kalen’s behavior was as expected, and I could feel a hum of satisfaction come through the bond when Kalen lay down, snatching Lycus’s pillow to use.
I wasn’t even sure he noticed he’d done it, but it was always the same when Kalen was in a mood. He would just lie in bed and sulk or stare off blankly when he was depressed, clinging to our pillows like they were a safety net. I watched, amused, as he rearranged our pillows so he could steal our scents from them.
Tobias walked in and paused at the tension in the room. I turned to him, and he nodded, letting me know he’d dropped Aleera’s dinner off to her. He glanced at Kalen. I shrugged, and he rolled his eyes before climbing on the bed and sitting next to him. Kalen rolled instantly, placing his head in Tobias’s lap. Tobias leaned back against the headboard and brushed his fingers through Kalen’s hair, and I could feel Tobias’s magic oozing out and calming him.
The tension left the room, and guilt flashed through the bond. Both Tobias and I looked at Lycus, knowing it was coming from him. Kalen was our weak spot in more ways than one, and we hated upsetting him. His mind was fragile. One minute he was fine and overly excited and bouncing around. The next, he refused to get out of bed, would harm himself, or try to kill himself. Over the last six years, I’d lost track of the number of times he wanted to end it, the number of times he actually did, and we had to pull him back from death. Each time we brought him back, he was more mentally unstable.
