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“The fuck it is!” Sin bites out, getting in my face. “Don’t fuck with my sister. You either want her in your life or you don’t. I will end you the same way we ended Thomas, if you string her along. Cut her loose or hold her close. There is no fucking in between. Do you understand?”
Saint attempts to pull him back, and he shrugs him off, staring relentlessly into my eyes. His burning with liquid fire in defense of his sister. It’s good she has him. It is good they have each other.
“He’s right, Austin,” Saint adds. “But if you cut her loose, I’m going with her.”
I suck in a harsh breath. Of course he would. I would too. My fingers curl into fists. “If I mark her and she leaves, it will destroy me. I can’t live through that again.”
“So, you are punishing her because you made a shitty choice the first time around?” Saint yells. “You think that if she leaves now, you’ll come out the other side in one piece? Because I think you are so far fucking gone for her, you don’t know which way is up. Shit, she even plays into your fucking kinks.”
“I do not need to know that information,” Sin replies, stepping back from me.
“You might be right, but Saint, you know what Sidney did to me–”
“God, just let it go. She is dead and gone and good riddance. She was a power climber. Her feelings for you were never genuine, there was no love for you. Audrey can and will if you just let her in. Jesus, man, you are so stunted emotionally.”
“I don’t know who this Sidney chick is, but my sister isn’t a user. She would never use another person for personal gain.” Sin crosses his arms and glares at me like I just killed a puppy in front of him. “But she will run if you push her away. She isn’t without her own scars.”
The sound of the shower turning off has all three of us facing the shut door. My heart is in my throat. Sin is right. I’ve connected with his sister in ways I never did with Sidney. Our times alone together have been so much more than my time with Sidney. But fear holds me in a choke hold. The great Austin Zade, ex-Mafia Prince, finally brought to his knees by an omega girl.
I shift on my feet as the door opens. A billow of steam preceding Audrey. Her gaze swings around us, barely touching on me, and I can tell she’s been crying. It tightens my chest, and I want to go to her and apologize, crawl on my hands and knees begging for forgiveness.
“All clean,” she chirps like a bird, a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes pasted on her face.
Still, she doesn’t look at me.
“Audrey–”
Like a squirrel on defense, her gaze flicks to me before she looks past me. “It’s fine, Austin. We don’t need to talk about it. A girl can only take so much—”
Rejection. That was what she was going to say, but she presses her lips together into a tight line and attempts to smile.
“Nevermind. I’m starving. The pancakes this morning are long gone,” she says as she comes to a stop next to Sin, her hand over her belly.
“I’ll get a fresh shirt on, and then we can grab some food,” Saint says, playing into her pretending.
A growl starts low in my chest, but I hold it in. What am I going to do with her brother standing right next to her? If I throw her over my lap to spank her, he would probably knife me where I sit. And I don’t really want to spank her. I want to beg her forgiveness from my knees in a very sensual way. If she’ll let me.
Saint comes back with a blue button-up on, still buttoning it as he walks across the floor. The twins watch him, Audrey, with a look of pure desire that I want aimed at me because I’m a selfish, emotionally stunted, bastard. While Sin appraises him with a more clinical stare. As in, Saint is attractive, but he is only enjoying the view, not wanting to act on it.
“Can we go to that diner Felix likes?” she asks. “I’ll text him, and he can meet us there.”
She holds out her hand, and Saint drops her phone into her palm. Jealousy at my pack mate andmy omegabeing so in tune. No words needed said for him to know what she wanted. I should be able to expect what she wants and needs.
If I had thought the torture she ensured that the man had suffered was bad, it is nothing to the painful way she ignores me. None of her bratty sub act or her soft calmness, nothing for me. It is like I’m a ghost for all the attention she sends my way.
Saint wraps his arm around her waist as we exit the building out onto the bustling street. Then he opens the waiting car door for her. She slides in and all the way to the opposite side, her brother follows, sitting across from her. And I nudge Saint out of the way and climb in next to her. It doesn’t matter that facing the rear of the car makes me carsick. It’s a short drive and being next to her means more.
Audrey tenses as I settle into the seat next to her. It is hard to ignore me if I’m right here. I run my hand down her arm, and she jerks as if she’s been burned. Then she curls it around her body like an injury.
“Princess–Baby girl–” I try both, and the only sign she even heard me is the slight flaring of her nostrils and the bitter-sweet perfume she can’t control. “We need to talk about this.”
I pin my gaze to her lips as she rolls them together and looks across the seat at her brother and Saint like she is planning on crawling over there and taking up a position in Saint’s lap rather than sit next to me.
It is here in my car that I see the full extent of how wrong I’d been. Audrey isn’t even on the same level as Sidney; hell, I barely remember her name or what she looked like anymore. But I could conjure the image of Audrey without thinking.
“Audrey–” I beg.
She flicks her gaze at me, her lips parting, pink tongue darting out to wet them. My heart gallops like a runaway horse.
