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“The only reason I’m telling you this is because I need you to stop. There’s only so much I can overlook, and you’re hurting her. You’re messing with her memories and the sense of security I’ve fought to give her. I’m not using her, and I never approached her with ulterior motives. I didn’t take her from you, Ryan. She’s always been mine.”
Ryan stares at me for a moment, as though he’s trying to assess the truthfulness of my words, and I stand in silence as he tries to make up his mind.
“Ryan,” I say, my voice soft. “SheisRay. She’s the girl I’ve mentioned before, the love of my life, the one who got away. When we were younger, I nicknamed her Ray, because she’s my ray of sunshine. It’s always been her.”
I run a hand through my hair and stare up at the ceiling. “Do you have any idea how it killed me to watch her with you? You think you’re in pain, but take a moment to consider what it must have been like for me. I spent years searching for her, only to find her in your arms. My younger brother, the very same one I vowed to protect, with the love of my life. Do you have any idea why she was interested in you in the first place?”
Ryan shakes his head, and I smile bitterly. “Your eyes. We both have Dad’s unique green eyes. She recognized them but couldn’t understand why. The only reason I’ve stayed silent was because she left you willingly, and I didn’t want to force her to be with me through knowledge of our past. I wanted to win her over fair and square, all over again. And I did. She came back to me, and that’s all that mattered to me. I didn’t want to burden you with knowledge of our past, and I didn’t want to risk you telling her that she and I have history together, because there’s a good reason she still hasn’t regained her memory. Her past is filled with pain, Ryan. Recovering her memories will wreck her, and I won’t put her through that for my own selfish desires.”
He stares at me as though he’s struggling to comprehend what I’m telling him, and I pray I’m getting through to him. I once vowed to protect him, to take care of him in my father’s stead, but I’m at the end of my tether. I can’t do this much longer. I can’t keep destroying myself in an attempt to keep the promise I made my father. “You meeting Alanna wasn’t a coincidence,” I tell him. “But then you know that, don’t you? Your mother never does anything without reason. You told me you met Alanna when your mother took you to volunteer at the beach, but is that something she’s ever done before? Didn’t she specifically point out Alanna as a way to get into my good graces? Why do you think that is?”
Ryan looks away, closing up at the mention of his mother. He’s blind to her shortcomings, and nothing I do or say will ever change that. He feels protective of her, but he doesn’t realize the love he has for her is what’s slowly destroying him.
“There’s nothing I can do or say that will make you understand why your mother and I don’t get along, but you aren’t stupid, Ryan. Surely you can see you’re being manipulated? I don’t know what she’s telling you, but look at the photo in your hands. Does it look like Alanna feared me? If you’re doing this to protect her, then stop. All you’re accomplishing is hurting her, and some of the damage may be irreparable. Some of her memories could be distorted and lost forever.”
“I’m not just doing it to protect her, Silas. I don’t give a fuck about your history with her. It doesn’t matter, because she can’t remember it, anyway. As far as she knows,I’mher first kiss.I’mthe first person she slept with.I’mher first boyfriend. With you out of the way, who do you think she’ll want to lean on?”
I smile humorlessly. “You won’t win her back this way. You can’t keep up the lies you’re telling her. What do you think she’ll do once she realizes you’re lying to her all over again?”
He looks away, the desperation in his eyes hitting me hard. He knows he won’t get away with his lies, but it’s worth it to him so long as he doesn’t have to see her withme.
“What is it going to take for you to stay away from her?” I ask, my tone defeated.
Ryan glances at me, a calculative look in his eyes. “What is she worth?”
I look away, my heart heavy. “Everything.”
He chuckles, the sound grating. “Then give me everything. Give me everything you took from us and I’ll tell Alanna that everything I’ve told her was a lie. I’ll confess, and I’ll never appear in front of her again.”
I look at him in disbelief. “Ryan, everything I took from your mother should’ve been mine in the first place.”
“Dad never wanted you to have the house or the company. That’s why he didn’t leave it to you, Silas. I’ll give you a week to think about it. If you decline, I’m going to see Alanna, and I’ll tell her you threatened me.”
He smiles as he walks away, leaving me standing in his empty living room. For so long, I’ve been holding onto the little boy who cried at our father’s funeral, the child that needed me so desperately. I’ve forgiven him for so much that he’s done, and in doing so I condemned myself.
ChapterSeventy-Four
Silas
I walk into our bedroom to find Alanna pulling her clothes off the racks in our wardrobe, and panic runs down my spine. “What are you doing?”
She whirls around, her eyes wide. “Si-Silas,” she stammers. “I thought you had a meeting that’d be running late?”
I stare at her in disbelief. “What are you doing, Alanna? Were you seriously just going to disappear without saying a word? Again?”
I walk up to her and grab her shoulders, my thoughts whirling. Does she have any idea what it’d do to me to have her disappear again? I nearly lost my mind looking for her. I’m not sure I can survive it twice.
“Alanna, no matter what happens, please don’t ever just disappear without a word. Please don’t make me worry like that. If nothing else, I need to know that you’re safe. Do you understand?”
She nods, her face marred with regret. “I wasn’t planning on disappearing, Si. I was going to call you after I left. I just… I didn’t… I wasn’t sure if you’d let me go.”
I pull my hands back and look away, my heart shattering. “You’re scared?Of me?”
She shakes her head and holds her hands up. “Silas, I’m really confused, and I… I really do need some space. I need to think. I feel like I’ve been immersed in a world that isn’t real. First with Ryan, and now with you. Most of my memories are based on lies. Do you know how that feels? Do you have any idea what it feels like to find out that every memory you cherish is at least partially a lie? Do you understand how much it hurts to know that the one person I trusted most lied to me and kept things from me the entire time?” She runs a hand through her hair and inhales shakily. “It isn’t just that I’m confused by everything Ryan told me, and despite the compelling arguments he made and my shifty memory, I still… I still love you. What hurts the most is that you’ve been deceiving me when you knew how much it hurt me when Ryan did the same thing to me. I get that you have your reasons, and you seem to think you had my best interests at heart, but you had no right. I just, I’m not sure I can trust you. I don’t know what’s real and what isn’t, and I don’t know how you’re entangled in my past and whether you’re someone I should fear. I don’t know, and it kills me that I can’t trust you to tell me the truth. Even if you want to tell me everything now, I no longer want to hear it, because I don’t trust you.”
Looking at her makes me feel like I’m losing her all over again. It hurts just as much as it did the first time. “Alanna,” I say, my voice soft. “I asked you once if you wanted to know about you past if it came at the risk of your memories being distorted, and you told me you didn’t want to know. I knew I didn’t have the right to keep it from you, so I gave you a choice, and your choice resulted in my silence. I really am the man you dream of, and I wanted you to remember it yourself. Everything you and I have gone through… you have no idea, do you? You’re the reason I am the person I am today. You’re the reason I worked as hard as I did. Everything I’ve done was for you. When I told you that youareRay, I meant it. It’s always been you.”
She stares at me with such longing in her eyes that I struggle to stay away from her. I close the distance between us and cup her face tenderly. “I’ve waited for you for five years, Alanna. I’ll wait another five years if I need to. I just hope you won’t put us through that. There’s nothing I can say that’ll prove my innocence, not now that my brother has already distorted your memories. All I can do is hope you’ll regain your memories and that they’ll lead you back to me.”
