Crowned by Fate (Crowned 2)

The cruelness of his tone is like a bullet right in the heart. It’s not that I expected anything more from him, but I guess a girl can never get used to being on the receiving end of her father’s disgust.

“It was always you. But why?”

“What’s happening?” Lydia starts squealing off beside him as another man dressed in all black takes my father by his arm.

“What’s happening, is that he had me locked in an asylum and drip-fed me drugs for the past six months, that’s what’s happening, Lydia. He!” I point at my dad when I notice one of the guards shift in front of him protectively.

“Isa, baby, stop…” Bryant growls softly in my hair. “Don’t show all of your cards right now.”

I swipe at the tears that were pouring down my cheeks, straightening my shoulders from the words Bryant just whispered into my ear. “You know what? Not right now.”

I spin around as Bryant takes my arm and Max shifts around the other side of me. The room begins to tilt, a buzzing sound screaming in my head. Colors and circles warp my vision, right before everything turns black.

The sex bruises I leave on her skin are nothing compared to what her hate has left on my heart.

- Bryant

Forgiveness isn’t an emotion that Isa feels. Whether by what the world has given her by its withered hand, or by her choice, she doesn’t forgive often. If ever. I already know what she’s going to ask when she comes back to us.

Did you know Max was my brother? Then I’m going to have to say yes.

She’s going to ask why I didn’t tell her, and then I’m going to have to tell her everything.

Telling her everything means I’ll lose her, but I can’t have lies between us anymore.

“She’s going to kill all three of us. You know that, right?” Devon murmurs, gesturing to both me and Max.

I lean back in my chair, flicking a cigar between my fingers. “You love her.”

“Of course I fucking do!” Devon yells, throwing an empty bullet casing at me. “What the fu—”

“—not you!” I snap, sneering at Devon. I look up to Max, who’s watching the flames lick around the fireplace. “You.”

Max doesn’t turn toward me, he leans against the mantle of my stone fireplace, arms tense. “Yes. Slightly repulsed that I kissed her, and almost other things.”

“It’s hardly incest. You’re her half-brother.”

I shake my head at Devon. “Shut the hell up for a second.”

He raises his hands in the air in submission. Devon is a pain in the ass, but I’ve known him all of my life. He didn’t get his name Reaper for being soft and I didn’t get The Beast for being a fucking puppy. Don’t let his pretty Ken-like features fool you. Fucking Barbie doll.

“It’s still classed as incest.” Max rolls his eyes, pushing off the fireplace and takes a seat on one of the many chairs I have scattered in my office. He runs his hands over his face. “I should have been smarter with this. I knew I felt something for her, and I thought well, she’s beautiful, so it must be attraction. It clearly wasn’t.”

There’s a hint of authenticity in the way he articulates his words, but fuck if I trust this idiot. Keep your friends in your pocket, right beside your enemies, and never tell them who is who.

“Or was it?” Devon adds, wriggling his eyebrows.

I cut him with a glare to shut him the hell up.

He runs his middle finger over his lips in the zipping motion.

“Continue. You need to start talking. Whether you live to see tomorrow or not, depends, I have to be able to trust you around Isa. So.” I lean back in my chair and light my cigar. “Tell me fucking everything.”

Max exhales. “I was fresh out of college when Peter offered me a job at Banks Psychiatric Hospital. I thought I hit the jackpot. Offering six figures already with no experience? Damn, that never happens.”

“Should have been your first flag, just saying,” Devon again. I have to count in my head to calm down before I hit him.

Max rests his head back. “I started working and over the five years I was there, built a relationship with Peter. I respected him a hell of a lot too.” He pauses, and I lean forward to flick the ash off the end of my cigar. “When he brought her in after your wedding”—my fists squeeze at the mention of my darkest day ever—“she fit the profile. She was erratic, multi-changing, and hostile.” He pauses. “Do you know what happened? With what she was seeing in her head?”

“What do you think?” I grin around the thick trunk of my cigar, before slowly sobering and shaking my head. “I know that she replayed everything in her head, from the moment she ever met me to the day of our wedding.”