102
AURORA
How is this happening? How did things get so fucked-up so quickly?
It’s been nonstop since the restaurant. Laying face down in the grass, I contemplate staying there. So what if Orion is letting me live? What kind of life am I going to have now?
I can’t think. My thoughts cloud and the tears just keep coming. They blur my vision and strip my cheeks raw. I lay there unable to move, unable to do anything as Orion walks away and leaves me in the darkness.
Then, another gunshot rings out like a crack of thunder, followed by a splash.
Cassian!
No, they didn’t! They couldn’t have!
It spurs me up onto my hands and knees, terror gripping me like a vice. I have to get out of here. I have to get as far away as I can and then…then…
I have no idea. No fucking clue what I’m going to do.
I crawl on my hands and knees through the garden, scarcely feeling the bite of twigs and small stones against my knees and palms. I reach the small stone wall that leads to the garage and follow it, not stopping for anything.
I have to get out of here.
It repeats like a mantra, the only thought in my head by the time I break into a sprint and run as fast as my bare feet will take me. Reaching the garage, I fling open the side door and make a beeline for the wall display where all the keys hang. Grabbing the first one I see, I press the button repeatedly until the lights on one of the cars blink into life.
I’m inside before I can even consider whose car this might be. A turn of the key, a flick of the locks, and I race out of the garage and down the driveway. No one stops me, and the gates are already open.
I don’t question why.
I can’t.
I slam my bare foot on the pedal and grip the steering wheel like my life depends on it. Out past the gate and onto the main road, I leave Hawthorne Estate in the rearview mirror, and drive with no destination in mind.
Fuck.
“Fucking fuckitty fuck fuck!” I sob, slamming my hands against the wheel over and over. Lucian’s heartbroken, angry eyes flood my mind, dancing between Orion’s broken voice and the sound of the gunshot near Cassian.
Is he dead?
Such a thought causes my heart to physically throb and my sobs become gasps. I need to breathe and think, but nothing comes. Nothing but despair. In minutes, Vincent was able to single-handedly dismantle my family with a lie of my own doing, and I have no one to blame but myself.
And my mother.
The sky is pink by the time I pull up outside her house. It wasn’t my plan to come here but sometime between when my tears dried and numbness took over, this was where I came.
It’s the only place I have left.
Selene is injured. Lucian and the others know the truth. I should be dead. I almost want to be. Slowly, I climb from the car, and one hand moves to my abdomen. Will any of this affect the baby? Is it too small, or is it already at the stage where it can tell something is wrong?
What the fuck am I going to do?
Barefoot, I trudge up the steps to my mother’s front door and pull the stained, dirtied silk robe tighter around my naked body.
Never did I think I would end up back here.
If there is any comfort to be had, it’s here. I ring the doorbell and wait.
My mother answers within thirty seconds and her calm face immediately sours when we lock eyes.
“What the hell do you want?” she snaps, dragging her sharp eye up and down me. “And what on earth are you wearing?”
“Mom—” My voice breaks and while I have no tears left to shed, emotion swells behind my eyes and my nose throbs.
“Aurora?” For a split second, there’s a whisper of comfort in her tone but it vanishes quickly. Her sharp nails dig into my arm when she drags me inside and the door slams behind us.
“What a state you are in,” she mutters, glancing me up and down once more. Then she turns and heads for the kitchen.
I follow like I’m ten years old again, home from whatever class she dropped me off at. The nostalgic scent of cleaning chemicals mingling with stale Chinese food drags me back to my childhood, and my body aches for any kind of comfort from her.
A hug. A touch. Anything.
I won’t get it. I burned my bridge with her but she’s my only port left.
“Everything is falling apart and I didn’t know where else to go.”
“Sit down,” she snaps, pointing at the table. “Tell me what happened.”
I sit slowly, huddling in the silk gown and pressing my knees tightly together. The numbness gives way to a full-body chill that causes me to tremble where I sit.
Do I tell her everything?
Fuck it.
What do I have left to lose?
“Someone tried to kill Lucian yesterday,” I begin, my voice rough.
My mother doesn’t react, busying herself with making a pot of tea.
“They shot his daughter instead.”
Her hands pause, fingers delicately holding two tea bags over the pot. It’s only for a second, then she continues working.
“She’s in the hospital and then, for some reason, things just went to shit, and I still don’t fully know how. Accusations were flying, and everyone was so angry. They think Cassian had something to do with the shooting and then they found out who I am, who I really am. Mom, they know about you. Who you are, where your family is from.”
She tosses a spoon into one cup and spins to face me. “Our family,” she says bitterly. “You may hate me, but you cannot deny where you come from.”
“Fine. Our family.” I’m far too exhausted to argue.
“They didn’t kill you?” There’s no emotion in her voice. I want to hope that when we stopped talking, she expected that outcome and made her peace with it and that’s why she sounds so cold. I know the truth. She detests me for her own reasons and that’s that.
“No, they didn’t kill me, because they love me.”
Cups clatter against saucers and the kettle rumbles to a boil.
Holy shit.
In the tragedy of it all, I hadn’t even realized that was the truth, but Orion’s words come back to me. He did what he did to protect Lucian and himself because they loved me.
They love me.
I love them.
Does Cassian feel the same?
Bitterness sweeps through my mouth as I remember the gunshot.
I’ll never know.
And it doesn’t matter because there is nothing left. That family is gone. Destroyed. What love was once there is nothing but a dream now.
Love won’t save me. It won’t save anyone. The pain turns to barbed wire inside me and I wince.
“And,” I say, finally voicing my last secret. “I’m pregnant.”
That catches her attention. My mother turns to me and sets two cups and saucers down on the table.
“You’re pregnant?”
I nod while she sits in the chair next to me, then she places her hand over mine.
“Who is the father?”
“What?” I sniffle as her fingertips press firmly against the back of my hand. “I don’t know who the father is. That really isn’t important right now.”
“Oh Aurora.” My mother smiles, but it’s void of warmth—merely a curve of her lips. “You have no idea how important that is.” Standing, she returns to the counter and picks up the tea pot.
“What do you mean?”
“Do you have any idea how valuable that baby would be if it belonged to Cassian, or Lucian? That alone would be enough to give anyone a first-class ticket to power.”
“What the hell are you saying? That’s not the point! It’s not a ticket, it’s a baby! My baby,” I snap, drawing my hands away from the table and setting them in my lap. “I don’t care who the father is. I’m…I’m heartbroken and lost and I was even worried about you because they know who we are now, as Everhart. They might come for you and you don’t even care?”
“They won’t come anywhere near me, and if they do, then they will learn what everyone learns.” She sets the teapot down.
“And what’s that?”
“That the Everhart are not to be messed with. Honestly, Aurora. What did you expect? Did you really think you come clean on your own terms and you wouldn’t face any kind of consequences?” She tsks softly behind her teeth. “Perhaps it’s lucky the truth all came out yesterday.”
An uncomfortable shiver crawls up my spine and what lingering nostalgic warmth I felt for this place immediately dries up.
“What are you talking about?”
“I warned you,” my mother says. She sits next to me and picks up the teapot. “I warned you what would happen if you turned your back on me.”
She begins to put the tea with the smuggest cat-got-the-cream look on her face that I’ve ever seen. What one earth did she mean by that?
Suddenly, a cold thought slivers into my mind.
No one knew Cassian was at the estate. No one but Lucian, Orion, and me. And my mother. I had given her that piece of information so long ago that it was barely worth remembering. Back when I’d been trying to appease her rather than standing up to her.
Nausea cramps my stomach and if I wasn’t already hunched over, I would have ended up that way.
“Mom … what are you saying?”
She sets the pot down and uses a small silver tong to pick up sugar cubes. “I told you, Aurora. Information is dangerous, and it doesn’t matter how much or how little you have. All that matters is how you use it.”
“You didn’t … ?”
It was her. I don’t know how, and I don’t know why but at this moment, I knew the truth. She is the reason Cassian’s men attacked the restaurant.
“You bi?—”
Suddenly, the side door to the kitchen swings open, and a tall man with sweeping gray hair strides in. His dark charcoal suit and golden tie scream wealth—far from anything in this house—and he looks incredibly out of place, like some kind of stolen ornate vase.
“Ana, we’ve run into an issue—oh.” He cuts himself off and his angular eyebrows dip down over his eyes. Despite his age, there’s a charming handsomeness about him that exists until he smiles. Then there’s nothing but a twisted coldness that turns my blood to ice.
I dart upward, withdrawing from the table and wrapping my silk robe even tighter around me.
“Who the hell is this?”
“Oh, relax, Aurora,” my mother says, sipping her tea. “This is Imro. He’s an old friend. I’m sure you’ve heard of him.”
