Nikolai steps between us, accompanied by his dull sidekick Jeremy, and puts a sudden halt to our harmless banter. “Leave before I fuck up your face.”
“Last I checked, that’s not a good starting point for a truce, no?”
“Let’s just go.” Bran pulls on my arm, but I don’t move.
“I won’t be taking a step outside unless, one, you give me your word about the truce.” I meet Jeremy’s gaze. “You know this is for everyone’s benefit. Cecily and Glyn included.”
“Not happening,” Nikolai grinds out.
“It can be for your benefit, too,” I say casually. “In return, I will refrain from breaking your face for the damage you inflicted on my brother.”
“Forget it, Lan.” Bran pulls harder, his fingers digging into my arm. “I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not.” I tilt my head in Nikolai’s direction. “I don’t like it when others harm my family.”
“Funny coming from you.” He tries to free himself from Kill’s grip. “Once I’m done with you, nothing will be left for anyone to recognize.”
“Please stop,” Glyn pleads with him and I realize that she’s also on my side now, her hands slightly shaking. She looks at her joke of a boyfriend. “Lan isn’t the type who offers truces, so can you take it?”
My baby sister knows me, after all. Because she’s right. Truces don’t exist in my vocabulary of fucked-up anarchy.
But then again, drastic measures need to be made to trigger a considerable change.
“Even if we agree to the truce,” Killian says, “Mia is off the table.”
“That’s not for you to decide, is it?” I smile and meet her gaze.
“She already told you no,” Jeremy says.
“I can work with a no.” I step toward her, followed by Glyn and Bran, who install themselves as my amateur bodyguards.
Mia keeps watching me with that tense expression as I slip a small box into her palm, then say so only she can hear me, “Happy Birthday, little muse. Remember, a future where you don’t belong to me doesn’t exist.”
Nikolai shoves me back so hard, I half fall on Bran and Glyn, who wince at the brute’s animalistic force.
The fucker is pushing it, and I will make him pay. Just not today.
“I’ll take that as you said yes to my offer. As for the Mia issue, I’ll leave that to her. Just know that I won’t take lightly to any censorship or attempts to keep me away from her. You can torture me if you fancy. I’ll also leave my door open in case you want to kidnap me and exact revenge for past travesties, so let me know your plan. Or don’t. I’m open to surprises.” I stare at Killian. “You and I are even, considering the whole Glyn situation.”
He steps forward, but Glyn and Bran are already pulling me back.
“I’ll be out of your hair,” I call. “For some reason, it feels like I’m not welcome here. I wonder why.”
“You motherfucking—” Nikolai comes for me, but Killian, Jeremy, and Cecily drag him back.
Mia stands there, one hand balled into a fist around my gift and her eyes blazing with inextinguishable fire.
I physically have to stop myself from running back there and kidnapping the fuck out of her.
Then it hits me.
The reason behind the horrible feeling I’ve been experiencing ever since she fucked off out of my life.
The peculiar emptiness.
The absolute lack of motivation for anything but creating schemes for how to get her back without fucking up what she cares about.
I’ve become categorically obsessed with Mia Sokolov. My mind has filtered the whole world out and all I see is her defiant face.
In every corner.
On every statue.
Every-fucking-where.
And now that I’ve seen her again, the last thing I want to do is leave.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Bran asks as soon as we’re out of the pretentious Heathens’ mansion and in front of my car.
I shake myself out of the strange phase I’ve been trapped in and focus on the disapproving faces of my siblings.
Glyn crosses her arms. “This is ballsy even for you.”
“I’m nothing if not full of surprises.” I grin and wince at the pain that explodes in my mouth. “That being said, I love your loyalty and the feeble attempts at protecting me.”
“More like we were trying to protect people from you.” Glyn releases an exasperated breath. “Can’t you just stop?”
“Stop what?”
“This whole thing with Mia.”
“No.”
“But you don’t care about girls.”
“She’s not just a girl.” She’s my muse. There’s no other explanation for this need to possess her until she wholly belongs to me.
The inexplicable urge to have her with me at all times.
It’s getting to the point where I don’t recognize myself when I’m not with her and that’s a serious problem.
“You mean to tell us you won’t discard her the moment you’re bored, which is due to happen very soon?” Bran asks.
“If I were going to get bored, I would’ve been so weeks ago.”
“But you will, Lan,” Glyn says. “That’s what you do. You get bored and you hurt people to feel a form of pleasure.”
“Thanks for the amateurish psychotherapy, little princess. But if you want to make your psychological endeavors more realistic, you should’ve inserted your boyfriend as a plug. Doesn’t he get bored easily as well?”
“Kill is different.”
“In what sense? You’ve managed to understand him because he’s similar to me, so why, suddenly, is he the love of your life while I’m the forever devil?”
“Because you’ve never made an effort to love us, Lan!” she screams. “I know you’re wired differently and no one can change your nature. I understand that. What I don’t understand is why you expect us to behave according to the lines you trace, and when we act out, you squash us until we fall back to where you want us to be. You protect us because of your sense of possessiveness and the fact that we make you look good. Bran and I protected you just now because, despite everything, you’re our brother and we care about you. We don’t calculate in our relationship with you and we certainly don’t use you just because we’re bored. All we want is for you to make an effort and stop following your narcissistic instincts when dealing with your own brother and sister.”
Tears gather in her eyes and Bran holds her by the shoulder, his expression as wretched as hers.
As the scene plays out in front of me, I recall the conversation I had with Uncle Aiden right after I cornered Mia in the tiny bathroom stall.
I’d intended to pretend to let her go just so I could sweep in again and remind her that I’m her only option.
But then I called Uncle Aiden. He’s Eli and Creighton’s father, but we’ve always been close because I’m that loveable.
Well, that’s a lie. He’s one of the few people who doesn’t judge me, despite my extreme chaos-oriented nature.
He also encouraged my dad to just let me be when I was developing my holier-than-thou personality.
Uncle Aiden has always treated me and Eli with respect, even though we’re different from everyone else.
Possibly because he shares some of our traits.
I put in my AirPods, fingers splaying on an unremarkable piece of clay that will definitely make it to the bin collection.
Uncle Aiden picks up after the first ring. “Why, hello, Landon. Is it just me or have you been avoiding me?”
“Me? Avoiding you? Not in a million years.”
“And here I thought you were reflecting about your recent reckless involvement in Creigh’s incident.”
“You know I didn’t mean to, Uncle.”
“Doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.” He pauses, then sighs. “You might think yourself a god, but your clear disregard for consequences will catch up to you sooner rather than later.”
I stroke the hip of my creation, then pause. “Maybe it already has.”
“Oh?”
“Hey, Uncle.” Stroke, swipe, stroke. “You always told me it’s okay not to be like the other kids and that I’m not broken. You said that just because my mind is wired differently doesn’t mean I’m any less than them. In fact, it means I’m more special.”
“That’s true.”
“So why the fuck doesn’t she see that?”
“She?”
“A certain thorn in my side who’s accusing me of being empty and a disaster to the tedious emotion called empathy.”
“And you care about her opinion?”
“No…I don’t know.”
“Then you probably do.”
“How do I stop caring?”
Uncle laughs.
I narrow my eyes. “This isn’t funny.”
“It is to an extent. You sound childlike with your emotions. But at any rate, if you want to keep her, you need to practice empathy.”
“No, thanks.”
“Then let her go and go back to your shallow encounters with people you barely remember come morning. That way, you won’t have to care for the rest of your life and will be able to wear the emptiness she previously filled as a badge.”
My movements stop, fingers resting on the hip. “How do you know she filled the emptiness?”
“Your Aunt Elsa does that for me. In fact, so does your mother for your father.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Your father wasn’t always put together, which is why he was a bit strict with you growing up. He didn’t want you to make the same mistakes he did.”
I didn’t know that. That must have been what he meant when he once said that he didn’t want me to regret my decisions after I grew up.
To which I naturally replied that I don’t do regrets.
Uncle Aiden continues, “That feeling of emptiness is a morbid emotion that eats you alive more and more the older you get, and unless you find someone to fill it, you’re irrevocably fucked. Sooner or later, you’ll succumb to higher felonies to reach that temporary reprieve that never lasts and will eventually self-destruct.”
I retrieve a cigarette, stuff it in my mouth, then light it. “I’m entirely uninterested in practicing empathy.”
“That makes sense since it doesn’t come naturally to you. But you have to think about whether or not you’re ready to succumb to a fundamentally bleak path just because you refuse to change.”
“I don’t know how the fuck to practice empathy.”
“Did you ever find yourself refraining from ruining or hurting something or someone she cares about because you understood that it would hurt her?”
“Maybe.”
“That’s a small step forward. You need to see the situation from her perspective first, not from yours. You have to shackle your instincts as much as possible.”
“You mean like I did whenever I wanted to hurt Bran and Glyn while growing up and directed that energy toward punishing those who hurt them?”
“Something like that. In fact, it’s best to have Bran give you advice on your relationship with her.”
“The prude who barely has any sex? Pass.”
“A relationship isn’t about sex, Lan. That’s a physical need that I’m sure you excel at. The emotional side, however, is your biggest weakness.”
“And Bran’s strength.” It’s not a question. It’s a statement.
“Remember what I told you when you were younger?”
“Bran feels too much and I feel too little, which is why we balance each other out.”
“Exactly.”
“He’ll never help me, Uncle.”
“Did you ask?”
No, I didn’t.
But as I look at my brother and sister, I fully understand the meaning behind Uncle Aiden’s words.
I, Landon King, lack something my siblings have in excess, and while I’ve always seen that as a power, maybe I need to reshuffle my cards.
“It’s pointless telling him all this, little princess,” Bran says. “He’ll never get it.”
“I do.”
Both Bran and Glyn look at me as if I’m being possessed by a demon who’s been expelled from hell for his friendly behavior.
“Is this a joke?” Glyn asks cautiously.
“When have I ever joked?” I grab both their shoulders. “I’ll make the effort.”
“Why?” Bran asks.
“Because you’re my family.” I smile. “In return, I might ask you a couple of things during the day.”
“Couple of things?”
“About how to practice empathy.”
Bran smiles. I don’t.
I know I won’t like this one fucking bit. In fact, my beast roars at the idea of being shackled, even if temporarily, but if it’s the price I have to pay for my little muse, then so be it.
MIA
“Good one. You’ve somehow managed to trap me.” Mr. Whitby—Frank, as he insisted I call him—nods in approval at my move.
We’re sitting in the empty club, only accompanied by the howling wind outside. Since it’s early afternoon, I’m safe from encountering the other members’ snobbishness.