Page 13 of Vengeful Valentine

“It isn’t ours.” Letting go of him, Ashmine rolled over, her dark crimson hair sweeping in the breeze.

“Is anything truly ours?” he murmured, shutting his eyes and falling back. His hair dampened by the morning dew.

“We are each other’s.”

Hawk didn’t say anything. He wanted more than anything to believe her words. To believe Ashmine meant something more than she did.

But no one had ever truly loved Hawk. No one had ever not left him. It kept him up at night; he expected to one day wake up and everyone to be gone.

It had happened time and time before.

Even now that Ashmine had been with him for over four years, he didn’t believe she was a permanent fixation.

Silas spouted they were all family, but Hawk didn’t agree.

Why can’t I just be happy?

Ashmine’s head settled on his chest and his hands reached up on their own to stroke her hair.

She was constantly changing the color of it, but he didn’t care. She was beautiful in every shade.

“Hawk, I’m not going anywhere,” she advised, the words muffled by his shirt. “I love you.”

“Like a brother,” he chuckled hoarsely before clearing his throat.

He always ended up speaking too much with Ashmine.

Growing up, he had been taught that he wastoo stupidto speak. That the words he said weren’t worth much of anything and so he had slowly stopped communicating altogether.

When he met Silas, he hadn’t spoken in over a year. It had taken time to relearn how to pronounce each word.

He had managed, but now he just preferred to remain in silence.

Except when it came to her.

“Hawk, I’m going to show you how much you are mine. And when all is said and done you can decide if my body is lying.”

Hawk wasn’t sure exactly what she meant until her hand found its way inside his pants. The cool tips of her smooth fingers tracing a line up and down his length.

His eyes shot open, she was watching him. Regarding his expressions carefully.

“I don’t think of you as a brother. Let me prove that to you.”

She did prove it to him, and only a few months later she left him, but not before destroying the rest of his found family.

His worst fears coming to fruition.

***

“You can take the masks off, I know who you are.” Ashmine’s steady voice cut through Hawk’s reminiscing.

For a while he had been broken, sad,alone.He had allowed his grief and depression to consume him.

But no longer.

Now he permitted rage to carry him through his days. The need for revenge. To show her how exactly it felt to be abandoned and hurt by those you cared about most.

All traces of sympathy washed away as vines of agony squeezed around his heart.

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