Burn (Virtues & Lies 1)

The panic I imagine she’s feeling is twisting inside me, choking me…and son of a bitch, he knows what he’s doing.

This is just like the hospital, a lesson. He’s driving his point home in a way he knows will stick, because that girl is just like me…a lamb to the slaughter. A message.

“She didn’t want to be Queen, you know?” he says out of nowhere.

Yes, I do know that.

“It’s all a lie. A carefully construed twist of history that was manipulated by men and that ultimately cost an innocent girl her life.” His words are like daggers to my already bleeding heart. “A passive and helpless little girl in a world of greedy, power-hungry men.”

Looking at him, my chest squeezes at the last part.

Little girl.

“The reality was that she was strong, intellectual, and brave. She was dangerous because despite her want of a quiet unassuming life, she wasn’t any of those things. She saw things she wasn’t meant to. Knew things that her male counterparts had no idea of because in spite of their education, their ego blinded them.”

When he looks down at me with his green eyes blazing like wildfire waiting for the slightest spark to blow, I have to look away. I stare at the painting in front of me, seeing it in an entirely new light even though I already knew everything he said.

“I hate this painting. Delaroche imagined it all wrong. His attention to detail is too vivid and glamorises the tableau he’s depicting. He watered down her suffering and her bravery, the darkness of the setting, with bright colours. He beautified a cruel act spurred by lies. A pointless exercise if you ask me.”

A deep sigh leaves him, and he takes a step back. As if I’m a part of the bigger picture, he watches me. Staying still, I give him what he wants until I can’t bear the heat of his gaze any longer. I step back, beside him, removing myself from that picture because I am not going to allow him to see me as some victim.

I’m here—well and alive. I am not some ill-fated princess and he needs to know that. He needs to know that I can bear the weight of whatever it is everyone is protecting me from.

“I get Kit a coffee and a chocolate croissant every morning. I can’t bring myself not to now that he’s…” Leo’s voice breaks silently and although it makes me sad for him, it sparks a fire inside me.

I can love you, protect you, and kill for you in one. Single. Breath.

I swear no one’s going to hurt you again.

The words repeat in my head again and again, and instead of making me pull away like I believe they should, they urge me closer to him.

I know there is a demon behind his armour. I can feel it vibrating, trying to claw its way out of him. But right now, all I see is a falling angel. His fire although fierce needs feeding.

I want to feed it.

I might be his Little Girl, but I’m not the little girl in the painting. I am more. And just like he protects me, I can look after him too.

Stepping as close as I can to him, I wrap my arm around his waist. My head tucking snugly into the crook of his neck and as I expect him to try and pull away, his head rests on mine.

His arms cross over his chest and when I rest my other hand on his forearm—the same one with the cross and the birds I love—he exhales. It’s deep and rushed. It makes him sag a little in my hold.

My Apollo. My young God that is equal parts shadow and light.

I want to protect him. Worship him. I want to keep him.

Chapter 20

Cassandra

The front door swings open before Leo and I make it to the top step, and before I can catch my breath, Mum lunges at me. Her arms somehow wrap around me over Leo’s for the longest moment before she takes a step back and proceeds to search me from head to toe.

“I was so worried!” she confesses, stroking the grazes on the side of my face. “What were you thinking staying out? After…after…”

“Penny, give them space.” Dad pulls her back into the house so that we can go in and I don’t miss the nod he gives Leo. Stepping behind me he wraps one of his arms around my chest, his hand squeezing my ribcage as the other balances the caddy with our fresh coffees and Arabella’s hot chocolate. The delicious croissants are his way of thanking her for sorting out my clothing.

Wayne walks past my dad towards the kitchen and as they touch shoulders he hands him the handgun Leo passed him earlier.

“That’s yours?” My words come out in a loud pissed off flurry, anger lighting me up from the inside out. I don’t wait for my dad to reply as he looks between me, my mother and Leo. “What the fuck is going on?”