Page 27 of To Have and to Hold

“How was your day?” Theo asked, louder this time, still leaning into me as if we were hugging. He made a groaning noise like we were squeezing each other, jovial and loud. “I’ve missed my little sister.” His eyes implored me to reply as he plunged the needle down, then withdrew it. What did he do? What was in that vial? Warmth spread from the tiny dot on my thigh, and I nausea roiled at the thought I’d just been poisoned. It certainly would be an efficient way to stop me from telling anyone what we’d done. I searched my brother’s eyes for a clue. Betrayal or love.

“Um,” I responded, my voice so shaky I couldn’t make my tongue work right as I tried to keep up whatever this ruse was. “It was g-good. A good day.” I paused and winced. “I missed you, too.”

“That’s fantastic news,” he said, his voice flat, nothing like the warm, vibrant sound I was used to. Then he pulled back, the needle nowhere to be seen, and stood, taking measured steps to my bed without turning around while my world tried to shatter. No. I stopped it. I trusted the man. I had to. He was… he was too good to harm me. I knew that. I had to know that or I’d die.

I was desperate to figure out what to believe. What poison he’d given me. He thumped onto the mattress and stretched his neck, bending his head left then right, appearing wholly innocent. A brother visiting his little sister, looking at her space in curiosity. “I can’t stay long.”

“You already said that.” I stared at him in shock, failing to mask it, waiting for the poison to take effect. My heart pounded, and my breathing picked up, making my veins pulse through my body and my skin heat. I thought I might hyperventilate, my lungs too tight, sharp with each breath. My vision blackened around the edges as the panic increased, goosebumps rippling over my neck, down my spine. The area he’d injected throbbed. I stared at my brother, trying to decide if he was a monster or a savior. Panic continued to bubble, dread. He had to go soon. Moments left.

Then he looked up and our gazes locked. He was stricken, shocking me back to reality. He shook his head at the sight of me, sinking down into despair. But he stayed away, sitting up on my bed with his fingertips clawing at my sheets and his eyes appearing for all the world like he was trying to share an entire manifesto through their power. He opened his mouth, then his gaze flickered above my head and he sighed.

“You’re safe,” he told me after a moment, where his face fell back into passivity. “From me, I mean. You’re safe.”

“I’m not safe,” I replied, my voice harsh and low. His words quelling the panic a fraction, my heart rate slowing to above normal but not dangerous, and my skin cooling with sweat. I hadnever been less safe in my life. Rafe was just biding his time, waiting to use and abuse me. Saving my body for a dark mood until I got pregnant with his spawn and that thing could eat me from the inside out while his father worked on the outside.

The blood leaking from me gave me life, even if it made Rafe threaten to take it away. As long as I bled every month, Rafe had won nothing.

“Well, you’re safer than you were.” His tone was strange, like he was trying to tell me something else. But I didn’t understand. He implored me with his expression to figure it out, but I couldn’t.

We stayed that way, in a deadlock, our eyes not moving from the other. My body ached for him. I let my mind drift to the nicer moments we shared. Childhood memories washed over with that hazy, halcyon film that made everything seem magical, even if it wasn’t. Flashes of him between my legs, the sensation of his tongue on me, determined to give me goodness, joy, despite being in the middle of hell. It all played across my vision, dancing between us as I fought not to move to him. To touch him, stroke his skin and kiss his lips.

It was a bone-aching, marrow deep need. But I stayed in my chair.

I shifted, squeezing my thighs together as a specter of Rafe threatened to bust down the wonderful memories. My demonic husband was at the corner of my mind, the pain, the depravation and despair he’d caused me edging its way over the beautiful moments I’d had with Theo.

He began to win, and I squeezed my eyes shut and buried my head in my hands, trying to hold back the sob that was threatening. I didn’t want Theo to see me break. All my life, I’d been trained for this, to be strong and stoic and take whatever a man gave, give whatever he wanted. But I was no good. To Rafe. To the family. To anyone. If only I’d let myself fall from that belltower… let myself stain the front of that church and go out in one burst of pain, rather than thisdrip, drip, dripof a life ebbing away.

Warm arms engulfed me, hushed me, and squeezed me tight. Theo’s arms were sturdy and safe, and I burrowed into him, tugging at his shirt to get him closer. A sob fell from me, a gasping sob of relief at his touch. If only. If fucking only this was us. This was our normal. I clawed at him, clung to him like he could breathe life into me. He smelled so good, so comforting. His skin heated as I pressed my nose into the crook of his neck and soaked him in. This was a mistake. How could I ever let him go? How could I go on and live this life knowing what it was like to be loved by my brother?

He sighed, groaned and swore under his breath as he held me tight enough my ribs creaked, and I couldn’t help it. I couldn’t. I laid a soft, almost unnoticeable kiss on him, right below his ear, and fought back a surprise grin when he swore again and shuddered against me. Even now. Even in this, he made me smile.

It just felt so good to be crushed against him, wrapped up in him. I sucked in a lungful of air, full of him, and allowed the comfort of it to slow my panic, my anguish. I let it in, even though I knew it would break me when it was wrenched away.

“Shh, beautiful,” he muttered against my ear, his warm breath fanning over my neck, making me shiver even deeper. My belly clenched up, something low and pleasant tugging in my gut. “I won’t let you die here. I won’t.”

The tears that had been clinging to my eyes broke free, streaming down my face and soaking my cheek and his shirt. “Please,” I cried into him, so desperate to keep him close, connected, so achingly in need of him it was worse than the physical pain from Rafe.

Theo was my brother, one of the few people on the planet less suited for me than Rafe, and I wasn’t sure how he felt, how he considered the night we’d shared, but the idea of not touching him again made me want to die.

“Stay alive for me, Vi,” he whispered, as if he could hear my thoughts. I pushed my face into the crook of his neck again, just breathing in his smell. Like warm spices and something sweet I couldn’t place, but it smelled like home, like comfort and safety. And his hands on me, never straying beyond appropriate, washed me with relief. “I’m working on a plan. You just have to stay alive.”

“Please don’t go,” I sobbed. “Please don’t leave me here. Please.”

The sound he made was so full of despair and pain. “Violet, don’t…”

“Theo, please, please pleaseplease…” I begged him, pushing him away from me so he could see my eyes, see the urgency. I would die. I was going to die. As soon as he was out of my sights, death would overcome me. I knew it. In that moment, I was sure of it.

“Stay alive for me. I’ll be back.” He forced his arms from me, yanked himself from my body and stood up straight, watching me reach for him with his expression flickering between false impassivity and real pain. Watching me try to stand, only to collapse to my knees at his feet. He groaned in anguish again, but took a step away. Then another.

“Don’t go Theo, I’m not strong enough, please…” My body curled in on itself, heavy and weightless all at once as I gave up any strength. “Don’t make me do this alone.”

“I love you, Violet,” he said, his hand on the door handle. Turning it. Leaving me.

I shook my head. “No, you don’t,” I spat. “No. No nono. If you loved me, you wouldn’t leave me here.”

The pain in his eyes was stark, his expression broken, a broken man before me. But he still left. He still turned that handle and left me there, begging and screaming for him to come back, to take me away, to save me and love me.

He didn’t, though.

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