Page 116 of High Stakes and Soulmates
Joaquin reaches the end of the aisle and hurriedly looks around for where to go before rushing to the far end while the footsteps grow closer.
I twist as I lift my gun and watch as the person steps out of the shadows. The moment I see that familiar face, relief washes through me. “Ezio?” I ask in shock.
“Let him go,” Ezio growls.
“It’s okay, it’s my brother,” I tell him as Joaquin’s grip tightens on my wrist.
“That’s not your brother, Cyrus,” Ezio says, his expression hardened. “You… all this time…”
I freeze, confused. “What are you talking about?”
“That is not your brother. That is Louis.”
I look over at Joaquin, who is watching Ezio closely.
“No… what the fuck are you talking about? I think I know who my brother is.”
“He knows who his brother is,” Joaquin says as he pulls me in front of him and kisses the top of my head while my entire body turns cold. It’s such a strange movement. It’s such a strange action.
“I don’t…” I look back at Joaquin like maybe he’s changed into a different person. Maybe he swapped out with my brother while I wasn’t looking, but the man behind me is still very much my brother.
“Ezio, you’re mistaken. What the hell are you talking about? This is Joaquin… This is… he’s my brother.”
“Years?” Ezio asks in disbelief. “You’ve been fucking with him foryears?”
Joaquin laughs. “Oh, I have. The sweet thing seems to struggle to remember what happened before the attack on his family,” he says as he smooths my hair back off my forehead.
I shake my head. “No… I… I remember you. You’re my brother. I remember… you’re in my memories. I don’t remember everything, but I remember you.”
“Please. Just let him go. This is between us,” Ezio says, the blade I’d given him still held tightly in his hand. “If you let him go and promise to never touch him again, you can do anything you want to me. You can kill me. You can torture me. You can enslave me for hundreds of years if you fucking want to. I don’t care as long as you let him go.”
“No… no…” I whisper, struggling to wrap my mind around any of this. Joaquin is my brother. My precious family. The very reason I’ve spentyearsof my life cut off from others because he convinced me that if he stepped out in the open, the vampire who was hunting him would find him and kill him. We were determined to find out who did this to us. Joaquin was the reason I fixated on finding our parents’ killer… to protect him… to save him.
He wasn’t… no… I feel like my entire world is coming apart and I can’t seem to understand any of it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
EZIO
Of course he’d try to ruin Cyrus’s life. Of course he’d latch on to him and fuck with him until he has no idea what’s happening. It was much like how he’d turned me just so he could continue to torture me for years longer than my human lifespan would have allowed.
Cyrus looks like his world is crashing around him as I try to understand how Louis has literally taken the place of his brother… but his brother is alive; I saw him… was Louis keeping him away and using Cyrus’s confused state of mind after the attack to pretend to be his brother? How much of Cyrus’s past does he really not remember that Louis was able to do this? Did he manipulate the memories he did have?
“Please,” I beg, hating the way his hands wrap around Cyrus, like he’s claiming him for himself.
“It’s been hundreds of years but we’re right back to the very same fucking spot, aren’t we?” Louis asks with a grin. “You trying so hard to save the life of another, and me about ready to show you that you will never have anything to love ever again.”
“Why do you hate me so fucking much?”
“At first it was because Arturo was mine. I owned him, and then you came along, and I hated the way his eyes were constantly on you. You threatened to take him from me and made me out to be a fool when I heard whispered words of him trying to figure out how to leave. There really wasn’t even anything special about you, so why would he even dream of leaving? Ezio, I do not like to share. Once I own something, it’s mine until the day it dies. And now? Now, it’s because I’m fucking bored after having been alive for hundreds of years with nothing to do, and fucking with you and him has been quite fun. He just loves me, don’t you?” Louis asks Cyrus.
Cyrus shakes his head like he’s still fighting to understand any of this. “But you’re my brother. I remember you. I fucking remember you!”
“He’s so confused. But that’s okay,” Louis says with a laugh. “It made it really fucking easy to manipulate him. He was horribly alone and devastated. He just wanted someone to show him an ounce of kindness, and the moment I did, he latched on to me.”
“Cyrus, your brother is still alive. But this man isn’t him. He’s been keeping your brother from you.”
Louis cocks his head. “Cyrus’s brother? I killed him…ohhhhh,you meanhim. Ah right, right. You know I made him into a vampire to keep you happy,” he says to Cyrus. “But he’s so fucking annoying. How can you even like him?”
