Page 318 of Psycho Devils: Aran's Story 2

Tears poured from my eyes.

It all felt so romantic.

We were teammates training and competing in awful circumstances. The twins never asked to date me or bought me flowers.

Maybe I was delusional, but I couldn’t imagine caring for someone as much as I cared for them at this moment.

I choked on a sob.

Wasn’t love caring for someone more than you cared about yourself? It was about being there for them. Standing up for them. Laughing with them. Love made the darkest days feel brighter.

The twins were that for me.

Sometimes it felt like I’d just met Luka, then I remembered I’d known him for months. Lived beside him. He’d been there as much as John.

I didn’t care that we didn’t call one another “baby” and whisper soft words as we touched each other. I didn’t care if John meant love in a platonic, friendship way.

I loved them like lovers did.

People were annoying.

They weren’t.

Case in point, I was having a panic attack and blubbering pathetically, but they were holding me up.

They always held me up.

From the first challenge where we’d been thrown into the sea to suffer, John had held me up for hours. When he’d left, Luka had done the same.

Memories of the punishment with John made my stomach hurt, and I blurted out, “But I’ve hurt you.” I couldn’t go another day not knowing if he was okay.

John traced his thumb gently under my eye and caught a tear. “Aran, you’ve never hurt me. You saved me.”

My lips trembled.

Luka wrapped his arms around both of us and said, “Same.”

I wept.

The universe had blessed my life when it had created not one but two of these amazing men.

I wasn’t alone.

Luka cleared his throat as he rubbed his chin across the top of my hair. John’s eyes were suspiciously shiny as he continued to stroke his fingers under my eyes.

“What are you three doing?” Malum ruined the moment by barking angrily, “We need to get to the arena. We don’t have time for this.”

John and Luka didn’t move.

“What do you want to do?” John asked me like Malum hadn’t spoken.

I wiped away my tears and pinched my cheeks, then used the shoulders of the twins as a crutch to pull myself to my feet.

They stood up with me.

Luka pushed me behind him like he was protecting me from Malum.

“We don’t have time for these theatrics,” Malum sneered, and flames shot across his temples in a creepy crown while his mates flanked him.

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