Page 125 of Wild Fury (Fallen Royals 6)

Her demons she needs to fight.

“Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad. I’m back in Boston, and I have some things I need to get off my chest. I don’t know if you’re ever going to watch this, but… even admitting it out loud will be beneficial to me. So I can have a record of this. Of being honest to someone other than Theo.”

She pushes her hair back behind her ear.

“Just over two years ago, at Amelie’s engagement party with Wilder, a man lied to get me alone. He tried to rape me. I got away.” A white lie to keep Lux out of prison. “You didn’t care about my whereabouts. You didn’t notice that I wasn’t beside you, or tagging along. There was only one person who realized I was missing, and that was my sister.”

She’s retreating. I can see it. My girl, who has worked so hard to come out of her shell, is crawling right back into it.

“Your lack of attention started way before then. It started when I acted like a normal kid—a brat—and your response was to ship me off.” She narrows her eyes. “I just wanted to ask and see if you ever cared? If, when Jameson or Wilder approached you and said I might be in danger of being a police suspect, you had any hesitation? Did you know what you were sentencing me to?

“I just wanted to be loved,” she whispers. “I wanted someone to give a damn about me because they loved me, not because I was pushed on them. My grandparents did the best they could, but they didn’t choose to have a child. You did. And then you abandoned me.”

I can hear their rebuttal in my head and know Lux made the right choice. This is her story to tell.

“I grew up thinking I was the unwanted stray.” She wipes a tear from her cheek. “God. I thought I was unlovable because of you both.”

Her gaze lifts from the camera to meet mine. My heart is tearing open for her.

“I’m back in Boston. I’m telling you this because I never want to see you again.” She pauses, letting those words fill the silence. “I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to know where you are, or how you’re doing. I love my sister, and I love my grandparents, but I’m done trying to chase your love. This is just a goodbye. And a fuck you, because you both should’ve thought about birth control before you had a child you clearly never wanted.”

She nods to me.

I click the camera off and stare. She just told her parents to fuck off, and I want to kiss her for it. But she’s very clearly not okay. She’s not even here, really. So I give her a moment and wait for her to come back to life. There’s still too much distance in her gaze, even after a long moment of quiet.

I hop up and sit next to her, pulling her hands into my lap. They’re frozen, too. I rub them between my palms, bringing them up to my lips and blowing on them as if we were outside.

She slowly melts back to her normal self, relaxing against me. Her cheek touches down on my shoulder. Her gaze is fixed on our hands together.

“How was it?” she asks. “I think I blacked out.”

This morning, she told me she wanted to send her parents a video message. She contemplated a letter, but that wouldn’t get the right emotion across. And there would be no response. If they read it, or if they didn’t, would be an unknown.

I can relate to Lux not wanting this to be another unknown in her life.

So she had me sit in her spot on the couch as she fiddled with camera settings, then switched places with me. I hit record, and I watched my Lux disappear right before my eyes. But the important thing is that she got through it.

“We should watch,” she says when I don’t answer. She rises, seeming to drift away, and collects the camera off the tripod. She steps past me to sit again, but I lift her onto my lap and rest my chin on her shoulder. “Is it bad? I don’t think I can do it again.”

I kiss the soft skin just below her earlobe. “It’s not bad. It’s perfect. You even said fuck you to them.”

She smiles. “I think I remember that part.” She shuts off the camera. “I trust you. Will you send it?”

I nod. Her parents deserve worse—not only for what they did to Lux, but both of their daughters. They’re manipulative and selfish.

That’s just putting it lightly.

It took a month of Lux living in Boston, living with me, to realize that her parents are the root of her self-esteem issues. I didn’t help in high school. I take responsibility for that. But I wasn’t the one who taught her that she didn’t deserve love.

And over the last month, we’ve relearned a lot.

Sex.

Joy.

Life.

I feel awake for the first time in years, and I attribute it to Lux. She’s come with me to the last few football games of the season—including the playoffs, which we won the week prior—and has formed friendships with some of the other players’ girlfriends.

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