That was my one stipulation to Quinn. My mother likes to read and it’s all she has, so she needs books and lots of them.
“I’m glad,” I say and it’s not a lie. I want my mother to be happy and content. She was the only one who tried to protect me when I was younger, and now I can do the same for her. I perch on the chair next to her and try to act like the sweet, attentive daughter the staff here think I am. It’s tedious but necessary.
After my mother has finished telling me about the other residents, her walks in the garden, and her books, she cocks her head and looks at me in a way that reminds me of myself when I look in the mirror.
“You’re miles away,” she says. “Is it one of those boys you’ve met?”
“Actually, all of them,” I say honestly.
My mother’s brows raise, a smug smile easing onto her face as if to say ‘that’s my girl’. “And you came here to ask me something?”
In her more lucid moments, Rebecca could always read me like a book. “The necklace around your neck. Have you seen it before?”
“The necklace?” Rebecca frowns, hand closing for the closed pendant dangling from her neck as she looks at it. “I…” Her frown deepens as she looks down and opens it to see the photographs inside. She glances back up at me. “You know, I honestly don’t remember but it’s got you and Dante in there so I’m assuming must be your father’s. Did he give it to me?”
Adrien would never give her anything, but I don’t correct her. It would just confuse her. Rebecca likes to forget what a bastard he is. “Do you know who the girl is in the photograph on the other side?”
I always assumed it was Adrien’s sister who died a long time ago, but now I’m not so sure.
Rebecca looks down at it again, twisting it toward her to get a better look. “No,” she says shaking her head. She looks up again eyes level with mine, but not at me, rather through me, her brow creased like it hurts to think. “Should I?”
Her smile has gone now, and that’s how I know I’m losing her.
I pushed too hard.
I give her a pleased look a dutiful daughter should. “No, don’t worry.” Then I lean in to kiss her on the forehead, removing the necklace as I do, slipping it into my pocket before walking out.
When I get back Lorcan and Jude are waiting for me. I ignore their annoying looks to take a shower and then dry off, changing into my pajamas. My hair is still wet but I don’t give a fuck. It’s the clothes that cling to me, making me feel suffocated and restricted, so I take the pajamas off again. The boys watch with dark eyes as I strip completely and crawl into the sheets between them.
The ugly buzzing is back under my skin, driving me fucking crazy. Short of peeling it off, I don’t know how to make it stop. Well, I do, but slicing someone up right now is off the table.
I need the boys.
But I don’t want to fuck.
I might kill someone, lost in the moment if I do.
Lorcan is the first to get it, sigh, and wrap himself around me. And then Jude, who wriggles out of his own boxer shorts.
“If we’re getting naked, then we’re fucking getting naked,” he drawls.
Then I’m stuck between the two of them while they update me on their grandfather. I’m absolutely shattered by the time they finish but feeling less erratic, so I stifle a yawn and tell them about my meeting with Quinn and my visit to Rebecca, leaving out anything to do with Dante. I still don’t know if it is him on the list. It’s just a hunch I have, triggered only by Polina’s goadings. Until I know for sure, the boys don’t need to.
Finally, Lorcan spoons me from behind, maybe sensing I need him more than he needs me. I lie there with my head on Jude’s chest, his arm around me, hand lazily stroking circles over my skin, and my ass nestled in Lorcan’s groin while he hugs me to the length of his body like he won’t ever let me go.
And then I sleep.
And dream of killing Dino.
Like I always do.
In the morning,the darkness inside me is somewhat sated by sleep and skin-on-skin contact, so I’m able to get up reasonably early. I go for a run and then have breakfast in the boarding house kitchen. Just a slice of toast, until Lorcan gets up and makes me a full English fry-up.
Jude wakes up late and steals some bacon off my plate before pouring himself a coffee from the pot, joining us at the table.
It’s a weekday so Saskia, much to her annoyance, has had to go to school. After I told Lorcan that there’s a good chance the infamous Ed Savino is his biological father and that he and Saskia might be twins, he begrudgingly told his sister. I heard her shouting at him in the early hours while I got ready for my run, and stayed far enough away that I didn’t have to get involved.
“She already knew some of it from helping Quinnm but she wasn’t thrilled to find out we might be the same age.” Lorcan snorts.