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My head snapped back as I recognized that voice that I hadn’t heard for ages. Tears welled in my eyes. Blood rushed through my veins as I combat-crawled toward the light, digging my way out of the messy hovel to get to the other side. To get to that voice. To get to the only one who truly knew me better than myself.
“Cliff…”
A commotion exploded inside the house, and then I saw him, my brother, standing on the small porch with a pale face like he was looking at a ghost from the past. And honestly,same.
It was like peering into a warped gender-bending mirror. His dirty blond hair had grown out now, maybe shoulder-length. I couldn’t tell because it was tucked back into a low ponytail. Blond scruff, the color of beach sand, decorated his strong jaw, and his skinny teenage frame had been traded for a boxy buff fit that suited his proportions. Every bit of sunshine he could muster was in his eyes—the very same shade of hazel-brown as our mother’s.
And mine.
My heart cracked. I dropped the hard act and sprinted toward him, throwing myself into his arms like we were at a funeral or expecting the world to end, or maybe like this was the one thing that would cure all that pain. The terrible nights I had spent awake in my bare bed were fresh in my mind now, just like the paint on Adrian’s condo.
Cliff squeezed me hard enough to pop my spine. I didn’t care. His rough touch and sturdiness allowed me to cry. Hot tears streaked down my cheeks as I buried my face into his t-shirt, the greasy stains on the off-white fabric somehow feeling comforting despite their sharp smell. I felt his weight shift fromone foot to the other as he encompassed me with his muscular arms. He rubbed my back, my shoulders, my spine. He kept pulling back, muttering something, and then whimpering as he hugged me tight again.
We did this for a few minutes uninterrupted by the newly appointed alpha, who I knew was watching us. I didn’t want to look at him. I didn’t want him to know he won this round, that I couldn’t take off without seeing my brother. Even though my brother never came looking for me. Even though he never called.
My Goddess, I couldn’t help it. I loved him. I hated our family, but I loved him. He was never truly bad to me. He was just confused. I kept telling myself that over and over, trying my best to pull away, trying to burrow my face deeper into his shoulder. Finally, he stepped back for real this time and held my shoulders, keeping me steady—or maybe he was trying to keep himself from falling over.
“You look—” He took a shuddering breath. Red decorated the rims of his eyes like he had just applied pencil eyeliner to them. “Faye, where have you been?”
“You would know if you’d looked.” Bitterness came easily with this kind of resentment. No matter how much I loved my brother and understood his past actions, I wasn’t in such a forgiving mood.
I was upset with Hector for snatching me out of a perfectly good pack and shoving me right back into the past. I was desperate. I was confused.I was being pursued by demons.
I wanted to plant my fist so hard into Hector’s jaw that it would make him spin.
And then I wanted him to kiss me.
I shook my head. “Sorry.”
“No, it’s fine.” Hector cleared his throat, frowned, and looked away. “You have every reason to be mad. I’m sorry. I just…”
He shrugged.
And I knew what that meant. “Mom.”
“Yeah, she was one concerned voice.”
“I thought you would have left by now, honestly.”
He smiled sheepishly. “Eh, I couldn’t ditch the ‘rents like that.”
“Are you saying I ditched them?”
His frown returned with double the sorrow. “Faye, no. What the hell? I would never say that. I just—”
I twisted out of his reach. “After everything they did to me, you’re going to side with them?”
“I didn’t say that either. It’s just—”
Thunder cracked the sky. A flash storm erupted from nowhere, soaking me through with frigid rain that pelted my head, shoulders, and back. The wind whipped through the trees, creating a hurricane-like sound that shook the side of Hector’s house. I stared at my brother as lightning flashed over us, illuminating the shock that had returned to his face—and the determination that sat on Hector’s face.
Fury boiled inside me as Hector descended the porch and grabbed my shoulders. He shook me once, hard. “Girl, you better cut that crafty crap out before someone gets hurt!”
I blinked at him like he was a vision. I tried to understand what he said—cut it out—but my body was rebelling against my brain. Logic had flown out the window, and all that was left was a gaping crater where my family’s love should have been. Iwas betrayed and abandoned, all while I was still living under their roof. It would have been better if they’d just dropped me off at a fire station. At least then, I wouldn’t have endured their persistent bullying.
Hector shook me again. “You did this in the car. I know you can make it stop. So,stop it, Faye.” He slouched forward so he could level his gaze with mine. “Come on, Cherry Pie. I know you’re hungry. Come on…”
His voice had dropped an octave. Now, it was like soothing honey melting inside a hot cup of chamomile tea. My fists unwound, revealing the painful indents left in my palms from my fingers that I hadn’t even noticed until just now. Tension drifted out of my body little by little as Hector massaged my shoulders, his thumbs coasting my collarbones and drifting toward my throat.
