Page 23 of Cruel Hearts

I don’t visit my sister as often as Ash does. She stares right through me. My nightmares have come back tenfold since Stella disappeared. I rarely sleep, but if I do, I dream about my mother, the water bloating her face, and then her features morph into Zarah’s. Her blank stare, like she doesn’t see me but knows all my dirty secrets.

“You should. You’ll feel better. She’s the only family you have left.” Ash pauses. “Besides me and my parents, of course.”

He adds the last smoothly, but they don’t bring me the comfort they once did.

I wish there were someone I could talk to, ask for advice, but there isn’t anyone.

I need to find a spine. Stella broke my heart chasing a title and a crown, and after seeing her, I shouldn’t feel anything more than resentment and hate. She betrayed my sister and me without looking back.

“I appreciate that,” I murmur.

“Let’s go out. You need to get laid. Call Nathalie.”

Nathalie’s the last thing I need. After Stella left, Ash hooked me up so I wouldn’t be alone all the time. She let me do whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted to do it to her. I’m ashamed to say that for the first year Stella was gone, I took my anger out on her. I offered to pay, but she said Ash had it covered. As the months slowly drifted into years, Nathalie turned more companion than whipping boy. Now we go to dinner. Talk. She’s still not Stella, but thanks to Ash, I don’t spend every night by myself.

I don’t want to think about Nathalie now. I can still taste Stella’s tears as I kissed them off her face.

I truly have turned into a monster. No. That’s not true.

I’ve always been one.

Shaking my head, I turn down Ash’s suggestion. “I need to get some sleep. Alone.”

He rubs his thumb over the rim of his glass. “I’m going to find Stella and make her pay for what she’s done. She won’t be that hard to find. I doubt she has anywhere to go.”

In annoyance, I drag in a breath. “Why can’t you forget about her?”

“Why can’t you?” he asks in return, his voice sharp.

“I was the one who used to be in love with her.”

“And now you’re not.” Ash finishes his drink. “Or did seeing her today...”

But please, Zane, don’t hurt me.Her desperate plea scratches at my heart.

“No. I just want to know why she came back.”

“Then I’ll find out. Leave it to me.”

I twist and turn in bed. Sweat drenches the sheets and fear shoots through my body. I clench the bedding, and my hands cramp painfully.

I’m dreaming about my mother. She’s underwater, and her hair swirls around her head, moving with the motion of the waves. Ragged tears in her flesh reveal bits of bone, and she reaches out a hand, skin dripping off her fingers.

Stella cowers behind her legs, and I try to dodge my mother to reach her. She stands firm, and Stella sobs, hiding. I feint to the left, then to the right, and my mother growls, “Leave her be.”

Her voice doesn’t hold the gentle tone she used when Zarah and I were children. She’s angry now, and she’s protecting Stella from me.

Suddenly, Zarah is there crouching near Stella, and they hug each other, crying.

My mother’s bony fingers dig into my cheeks, and I’m so close to her I can see the maggots where her eyes used to be.

“You are a fool,” she hisses. She raises her hand, maybe to slap me, but I jolt awake and fall out of bed. My temple clips the side of the night table, and pain bursts through my skull.

Desperately, I scramble, ripping the sheet from around my legs, and lurch into the bathroom. I empty my stomach into the toilet as sweat slithers down my back. I heave until there’s nothing left, and when I’m finished, I rest my forehead against the seat.

My world is crumbling around me, and I can’t stop it.

I wash my face, change into fresh pajamas, and go downstairs. Lucille is already in the kitchen, though it’s not quite seven. I’m grateful she didn’t quit, though alone, I don’t generate enough work to keep her busy. I don’t know how she spends her days, but whenever I’m conflicted like this, which is a lot of the time, her presence grounds me. Zarah isn’t my only family. Lucille is a constant in my life who will never leave.

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