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The kitchen was silent until I pulled a cup from a cabinet on the wall, clanking it against another cup. It was a good thing it wasn’t one of the fancy sets that Declan, another un-biological brother, insisted had to live inside the glass displays and not be touched. He had the weirdest ways. He didn’t drink coffee, tea, or hot chocolate all that much, but he collected fucking cups.
I survived on coffee. It was my only remaining addiction, and it was one I’d put up with, as it did me favors, like keeping me awake, whereas every other addiction caused me nothing but problems. Drugs, alcohol, and the strongest one of all, a pretty little redhead who I hadn’t let back into my conscious mind for eight fucking years.
The constant dreams were hard enough.
But that was where I forced her to stay.
That was until three weeks ago when the woman I’d killed for told me to right my wrongs.
She’d opened up a door, and I’d tugged like fuck to get it closed again, but something was stopping it from closing. A niggling question that tried to claw into my brain.
Where are you, my little nightmare?
Catharina had earned that nickname because the second I pushed her from my waking thoughts, she invaded my dreams, and that was why I hated fucking sleeping.
I hated seeing her battered and bruised.
I yawned, that avoidance of sleep making itself known.
A crystal lamp created a glow that crept up behind me. The light made me aware there was already a cup out for me, milk at the bottom, lightening the deep color, and a dash of sugar that sweetened and added to the scent of coffee beans that encouraged me to take it.
“It’s for you.”
I turned toward the robotic voice, facing the little boy trapped inside the body of my twenty-eight-year-old brother. His scarred chest was on display, grey sweats hanging low on his hips, matching mine. They probably were mine. He had a habit of inheriting my stuff of his own accord.
“The right amount of sugar?”
“Probably,” he said, with his electrolarynx pressed to his throat. “Woodrow made it before he left again.”
Woodrow, being the host of the body they shared.
The China wasn’t hot against my lips, and neither was the liquid as it washed down the words stuck in my throat.
“We’re sorry for stressing you earlier.”
My eyes lifted from the cup.
“Don’t be.” I took another sip. Rarely did I enjoy edging his anxiety, and my lack of forgiveness would do that. The only time I ever played into his insecurities was when someone else was at the front of his psyche. Someone who would deal with the anxiety by over powering it with rage, and I only did that when my self-worth was so low I thought I deserved a slap.
I didn’t feel like that tonight, not anymore. I’d already had a bruising. So many punches had flown at me, and it was impossible to avoid every fist.
The monster I killed was a tough guy. I’d give him that. He put up more of a fight than the other six together.
Apparently, some scumbag traffickers did value life, their own.
I smiled inside my cup.
“It’s fine, Woody. I forgive you.”
“I hope so.”
“You know I always do.”
“I know. That’s why you’re the best big brother.”
I drank some more, closing my eyes to the delicious taste as I neared the bottom, where it was just a touch sweeter.
“I’m sure you say the same thing to Dec and Ollie.”
