Page 61 of Beautiful Sinners

I’m given a moment of reprieve when the door cracks open.

“Oh, gosh. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know it was occupied. It wasn’t locked,” a woman hastily rambles.

I turn to the sink to wash my hands, needing the extra time to think about how I’m going to broach the subject of being in love with the three men who used to be my childhood best friends.

“You don’t understand,” is what I wind up saying, which isn’t helpful at all.

“I think I understand perfectly. Jesus, Synthia. You’re not a kid anymore, and neither are they. And Hendrix—”

I don’t like how she sneers his name like he’s someone disgusting and beneath her.

Drying my hands with paper towels from the dispenser, I rotate back around to face her.

“What about Hendrix?”

“You don’t understand the man he’s become. He’s not the little boy you once knew. He’s twisted and—”

“Stop.”

She rants right over me. “Has he told you what Eva—”

“I said stop.”

“And Constantine is—”

My temper bubbles to the surface. “Enough, Mom!”

Calling her Mom puts an abrupt halt to whatever secrets she was trying to spill. Those secrets are the guys’ to share with me, not her. So much has happened to all of us during the years we were separated, and that amount of baggage takes time, love, and patience to unpack.

A fleeting…something… passes over her face. “Hendrix and Constantine don’t care about the collateral damage they cause or who they hurt. They’re dangerous.”

“So is Tristan, or does he get a free pass because he’s your brother?”

Tristan’s darkness is more subtle, not as visible as mine or Hendrix’s or Constantine’s. He hides it behind a cocky attitude and smart-ass wit. That doesn’t make him less deadly when crossed. The exact opposite. He showed me a brief glimpse of it when we were caught outside in the rainstorm. I remember the fear that skated up my spine when I turned around. His cold, deadly expression when he thought I was about to walk away and leave.

As I toss the balled-up paper towels into the trash receptacle, I experience one of those metaphorical lightbulb moments of clarity. She seems to be aware of a lot of things for someone who faked her death and erased her existence.

“How long has Cillian been spying on them?”

Alana averts her gaze. Her refusal to answer tells me what I need to know.

Blood oaths, manipulations, and secrets. Evan saying he was forced to attend Darlington Founders, and his proclamation that‘it was time’when I questioned him about my acceptance to the prestigious university. And Alana is neck-deep in all the subterfuge.

A heavy melancholy settles over me. Is there no one I can trust? Has my life been one giant fabrication that benefits everyone else’s purposes but my own?

“When we get back to Falcon Tower, you’re going to tell Tristan and meeverything.”

With the toe of my borrowed boot, I hook under the foot handle at the bottom of the bathroom door to open it, only to stumble backward when it gets shoved inward from the outside.

“Excuse me,” I start to apologize to the person trying to get into the restroom, but it never passes my lips because Aleksander Stepanoff’s cold, gray eyes lock directly on me.

Taken by surprise by his sudden appearance, I’m frozen in place as he forces his way inside.

How is he here? In Texas.Fuckfuckfuck.

Hatred and fury quickly overtake the shock when I fixate on the man with him whose gun is pointed directly at Alana.

Aleksander makes no move to attack. Just stands there, staring at me. I stare back, but it’s not him I see. His face blends with that of his twin brother’s, and I’m transported to the garden when Aleksei was going to kill Constantine. My mind goes into sensory overload as my frenetic heartbeat pumps adrenaline into my muscles until I’m vibrating from the potency of it.

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