Tainted Butterfly (Tainted Knights 2)

I pushed everything that was going on with Gray to the back of my mind and grinned up at my brother as he came down the stairs. “You have a perfectly good bed in your room, you know. Alicia didn’t turn it into a home gym like she threatened when you left.”

“I know that, brat. But I just want to spend more time with you. It feels like I haven’t seen you in forever.” He hugged me. “Fuck, baby sis. I’ve missed you like crazy.”

I hugged him back, holding on tight. “I missed you too.”

“Yeah, well, prepare to miss her even more,” Gray muttered in an angry voice, making Jace’s head snap up. “She might not come back with us next week.”

My jaw clenched when I felt how tense my brother suddenly became. He pulled back so that he could look down at me, and I could have gladly stabbed Gray in the balls.

“Why?” Jace asked.

One simple word was full of so much feeling. I could see confusion and hurt already swirling around in his blue eyes.

“I don’t want to leave Alicia alone. We’ve gotten really close lately and—”

“And nothing!” Jace’s hands tightened on my arms, but not hard enough to hurt me. “This isn’t the plan, Kassa. The plan was for you to graduate and then come to California with me. Alicia approved of that plan—she still approves of the plan. You’re set to start UCLA in the fall. Everything is in place but you.”

“There’s nothing wrong with going to the local community college,” I tried to argue, but that not only set Jace off, but Gray went ballistic behind me.

“You are not going to community college!” Jace yelled.

“The fuck you say!” Gray practically roared, cutting off whatever else my brother would have said. “Are you telling me that you’re going to stay here full time? Not just for the rest of the summer, but actually for fucking ever? Is that what you’re saying, Kassa?”

I lifted my chin and glared at him, pissed that he had just blurted everything out to Jace the way he had. I knew why he had done it. He thought that Jace could change my mind, sway me into agreeing to go with him when he left. But this wasn’t something I could be bullied into. It was my future I had to think about and whether or not I could handle that future being filled with all of Gray’s random fucks.

“It’s an option, yes.”

“No! No fucking way. I won’t allow it. You belong with me … and Jace. And we will be in California.” He crossed the space that separated us and leaned down so that our eyes were on the same level. “You’re coming back with me next week. End. Of. Discussion.”

I tried to push him back with both hands on his chest, but he was unmovable. I couldn’t remember ever being so mad at him. I poked him in the chest, annoyed when I only stubbed my finger against the hard muscle. “You are not the boss of me, Grayson Knight. You don’t have a single say in what I do with my life. I’ll go to whatever college I want to and live my life. If I don’t want to go to stupid California with you, then I’m not going to go. This is my life, and guess what? You don’t get to decide what I do with it.”

“Holy shit,” Kin exclaimed behind me. “What did I miss?”

Jace scrubbed a hand over his face, a face that looked just as lost and sad as Gray’s had earlier. “Kassa doesn’t want to come back with us next week.”

“I didn’t say I don’t want to go,” I tried to argue, to make him understand. “I just have other things to consider before I leave the only home I’ve ever known. I’m not like you and Gray. I can’t just up and leave without a backwards glance. Alicia will have no one if I come with you.”

“But she wants you to come,” Kin said to assure me, her face tight as she watched the emotions playing across her boyfriend’s face. “She told me so herself just the other night.”

“All our lives, it’s been me and you, Kas.” Jace turned me away from Gray so that I was facing him. “Us against the world, I use to tell you before we went into foster care. I had your back no matter what, and you had mine. This past year, with us on opposite sides of the country, it didn’t feel right. Maybe I didn’t count down the days like Gray did, but I have been looking forward to you coming to live with us just as much as he has.”

Tears choked me, but I shook my head. “Jace, please, just try to see it from my point of view.”

“I thought we had the same point of view,” he muttered. “Before Christmas, you were so excited to come live with us.”

“Before Christmas, Alicia and I never saw each other. We were strangers who lived in the same house. Hell, I’m pretty sure she forgot I was even here half the time. Now, she’s one of my closest friends. I don’t want to leave her all alone, not when I know how much that sucks.”

“Okay, guys,” Kin interceded when it looked like Jace was going to argue with me more on the subject. “Let’s all take a deep breath and chill for a minute. All sides have made their cases, and now, let’s take the time to reflect on everyone’s point of view here.”

“I’m done arguing about it,” Gray bit out, pulling everyone’s eyes but mine to him. “She’s coming back one way or another. I’m not spending another week out there without her.”

“That’s all you think about, isn’t it?” I snapped. “It’s always about what you want, Gray. Always you. Has it even entered your mind that maybe you could be something other than selfish and care about what I want for once?”

His head jerked back as if I had punched him in the face. “I think about you every minute of the day, Kassa. I worry about you and slowly lose my mind wondering if you’re safe or happy. All I have ever cared about is you.”

That had my mouth snapping shut, but my heart felt like it was being wrung with those words still echoing through my head. He loved me, I knew he did, but what he had just said proved it to me.

It just wasn’t the type of love I wanted. But I had learned that, in life, no one ever gets everything they really wanted.