21. Max

Max

21

She can't get pregnant.

The plans to keep her as ours are once again slipping through our fingers.

"Mad?" I snap, not looking away from Violet pinned beneath me.

"What? How was I supposed to know?"

"It was your job to check."

Violet writhes beneath me as the chokehold I have on her neck tightens. I'm using my weaker arm to hold her down and it makes me feel so fucking good knowing that I can pin her down like this whenever I want.

This is exactly why I wanted to wait so long for this night to happen.

"I did! I looked through all her stuff and didn't find any pills. I didn't think she might be on anything else."

"For fuck's sake, Mad!" I let go of Violet and she gasps for air as I round on him, getting up in his face.

"Don't start anything, Max." He looks down at Violet and I follow his gaze. She looks scared. Of me? For Mad?

Fuck!

This is all going so wrong.

Storming out of the bedroom, I slam the door behind me. I should keep walking, leave for a bit and really cool off, but I linger outside the door listening to them.

"Why is he so upset?"

"He's just struggling to process a lot of things right now. We both are. Vi, we thought we'd never see you again. Then we made all these plans to punish you for leaving us. We wanted to hurt you."

"And now? Is that what you still want…to hurt me?"

"I…I can't, the last thing I want to do is hurt you any more, baby."

How can he be so soft with her?

She was planning on leaving again tonight and now she's ruined our plans to keep her tied to us with a baby.

I thought she'd hate both of us after tonight. I was prepared for that, content with it even, as long as she ended up with us I didn't care how she would feel about it.

It seems that her and Mad have become closer than ever.

I'm different now, she's seen my scars, touched them. I'm not the same as my twin anymore. He's changed in his own ways, yet she's fine with that and not me. Violet's choosing him.

When I was younger I wanted to be different, to have my own identity that wasn't linked to Mad, but I realized we were always meant to be two halves of the same person.

Now that long forgotten wish has come true and there's no taking it back.

I'd give anything to go back to the night of the accident and stop all of this from happening.

What if they both try to leave me now?

She's got the perfect twin at her beck and call. I know Mad would do anything for her.

The angry voice in my head tells me I have to stop them from leaving.

Without bothering to put any clothes on, I grab one of the aluminum bats from beside the front door and head outside.

The weight of the bat in my weaker arm is a hollow reminder of everything I've lost.

Ignoring the flare of pain in my shoulder as I raise it above my head, I slam it down onto the hood of Mad's car.

The dull vibrations that shoot up the metal and into my arm only give me more incentive to keep going. I aim for the windows this time. Smashing the bat into them until glass flies everywhere.

"Max, what are you doing? Stop it!" Violet calls out from behind me. I ignore her and keep swinging until I feel sweat dripping down my back. Even when the pain becomes so bad that my ears ring because of it, I keep going.

"No, Maddox, let me go."

"You're going to get your feet cut up if you go over there. Leave him to it. Let him get it out of his system," Mad says to Violet, but what the fuck does he know?

So much for our twin bond.

There's no getting this rage out of my system, not whilst she still has any chance of escape.

If she gets her hands on the keys, she'll be gone.

"Max! Stop! You're hurting yourself!" She shouts with desperation.

My shoulders heave from exertion, as I prowl forwards. She's standing there with a thin sheet wrapped around her whilst Maddox stands guard next to her in a pair of sweats.

Ignoring the disappointed look he gives me, I aim the bat at her. "Enough, Violet! Go back inside and get some rest, because there's not going to be any more peace for you, not now that we have you."

There's more pain, everywhere, in my limbs, my heart, my fucking soul. I can barely see straight let alone think clearly. If I can just get her back inside then I can calm down and come up with a new plan.

"No, Max. You can't just keep telling me what to do. I want to talk to you. We need to talk about what happened."

"There's nothing to talk about! All you do is lie. One minute you say you want us then the next you run away. It's what you've always done. I should break your legs so you can't even crawl away from us," I snarl, viciously at her and she actually looks afraid of me.

"Max," Mad warns me with a low growl.

I know I'm going too far, but I can't stop myself.

The pain is a like thunder roaring throughout my body, deafening me to reason and it won't stop until it's consumed me.

I raise the bat over my head, not intending to hurt her, but I need to get this feeling out of me.

A good scare should put her back into submission.

Before I can do anything, Mad charges at me, knocking me to my back.

"Don't you dare fucking hurt her!" He shouts as he pins me down. Everything goes white for a brief second and it feels like my body is about to implode.

"I need it to stop," I hiss through my teeth, tears burning my eyes. Mad's face drops as he sees my pain, maybe even feels it too.

"It'll pass, it always does. Just ride it out, but do not take it out on her." Mad's voice is low enough for only me to hear. He thinks he understands, but I've not been telling him the whole truth, that the pain never just passes. Sometimes it's bearable, but it's still always there and I can't take it anymore.

"No, Mad, I'm fucked up. I'm broken. There's no going back to the old me, the one that she deserves."

"Don't fucking say that. She loves every part of you and you deserve to let yourself accept that. You're not broken. I know you're in pain all the time, I can see it no matter how much you try to hide it and she will too. So let her in. Let us both help you."

Violet drops to her knees next to us and rests her palm on my shoulder. "Max, I know that no matter how many times I say sorry it'll never be enough, but please believe me that I am. I never meant for you to get hurt. I've missed you both so much."

As I see the terrified look in her eyes, everything I've done catches up to me and I know I made the biggest mistake of my life the day I swore to punish her.

"You think I care about this?" I motion my chin towards my arm. "It's fucked up, but it's better than seeing you get hit by that fucking car! Every time I close my eyes, it's all I can picture. I hear your scream over and over in my head. Then I see you dead under the tires. For so long, I couldn't tell what was real and what was a hallucination. All I wanted was to see you and touch you again, but you left us, Violet. You had so many chances to come back and you just stayed away. Then we came for you and you were with him."

"I didn't know who he was! I thought he was just someone from school. I swear. If I had known his dad was the one who—" she breaks off with a sob and I look at Mad. He shakes his head telling me she really didn't know. "He never mentioned it. Not once."

"You didn't recognise his name from the trial?"

"No. I avoided everything about the pair of you. All I knew was what my mom told me. It's my fault, I shouldn't have hid from it all."

"And the texts?" There's no way she can lie herself out of that.

"She thought they were from us." Maddox eyes are sincere and I know that I need to start believing in her again.

I should have believed in her all along.

Rather than letting my pain rule me, making me jump to the worst case scenario, I should have been there to help get her away from James. Instead I left her to fall victim to whatever mind games he was trying on her.

He found a way to take advantage of her and took that picture.

I'm such an idiot.

She was wearing that skirt to the house party the night of the accident. The night she was absolutely wasted.

All the pieces are falling back into place, but there's just one thing left I need to know. "Why did you have your bag packed tonight?"

"Because I wanted to leave with you, you idiot!" She snaps, rearing her head back. I shove Mad off me and he sits back on his heels.

She wanted to…

Shit.

I've been so blinded by my pain and the twisted ideas I conjured in my head, that I didn't think she would ever actually come to the decision to be with us on her own terms.

I sit up, shaking, with anger? Relief? I'm not sure what this feeling is. All I know is I can't bring myself to look at her. Not after I've fucked up so badly.

"Vi, come on, let's go take a shower together, warm you up. Give Max some time to himself."

"No! We can't keep avoiding this conversation. You're not hearing me. I was ready to be with you. I've always been ready. I was just too scared to do it by myself. Back then, if you had told me to stay, that we could make it work, I would have. But you didn't want me!" My eyes snap up to meet hers as she looks between both of us.

"What are you talking about? We've always wanted you! I thought we made that clear. Before we even knew what that meant, when we were kids we adored you. The cute, little blonde that looked so much like us, that followed us around like a shadow. We liked it, we fucking loved it. Tell her, Mad."

I look to my brother for help to make her understand, but all he does is silently nod.

"Then why did you push me away?" She asks quietly as she looks straight at Mad. Fresh tear tracks line her cheeks. "I wanted to be there for you. For both of you. But it broke my heart."

"What did, sweetheart?" I ask.

She looks confused. "You didn't want me. Maddox pushed me away, told me to leave. I thought neither of you wanted me. I couldn't come back and hurt you again, either of you. I'm so sorry, Max, it's all my fault what happened to you. I never should have ran, I got scared because I love you. I've loved both of you for so long, but I thought you didn't want me. You kept pushing me away."

"Violet, we didn't tell you to get on your knees that night for no reason. We didn't come to pick you up from that party because we didn't want you." I get to my feet and stare down at both of them.

"But both of you kept acting so differently before that."

Mad gets to his feet and helps Violet to hers. He wipes the tears from her cheeks then says, "We're family, Vi, it's not like we could just parade down the street hand in hand. We couldn't touch you like we wanted to, couldn't kiss you or tell you what you meant to us. We were scared that if we told you what we really wanted to do to you, you'd run. Then you did and you nearly died because of it."

"Then why did you tell me to leave?" She sobs as she looks into Mad's eyes. "If you wanted me so badly…"

"Mad, did you really tell her that?" The bat I've been clutching, like it's my last lifeline, slips from my fingers.

"I…I don't remember exactly. I was messed up, you were still in the hospital and I guess I may have said something like it." He stares at the ground as he talks, like he feels too guilty to look me in the eye.

"It doesn't matter now," Violet says, giving me a soft smile. "I'm here with you both again."

"Of course it matters! Mad, we tell each other everything."

How did I not realize?

Fuck, I should have known there was something he wasn't telling me.

"You wanted to punish her for leaving, when you're the one that told her to go?" My thoughts are spiraling down into dark places again, dragging my happiness away with them.

"I wasn't thinking straight!" Mad clips out.

"You knew that she might end up hating us after we bulldozed back into her life!"

"Please, stop arguing! I don't hate you, I love both of you. I want to be here." Violet places her hand on my arm, on my scars and I shove her away with too much force.

She stumbles back, her feet getting tangled up in the sheet wrapped around her. As she tries to right herself, she trips backwards and lands on the wooden steps leading up to the cabin's porch. Her head bounces off the top step, with a loud crack and she cries out in pain.

"Vi!" Mad runs to her without a moments hesitation.

Flashes of her covered in blood, her screams ringing in my ears, all fill my head. I blink them away as ice cold terror starts to grip at my chest. I'm back down in that darkness again, lost and alone. Not knowing what's real anymore.

No, this is real. She's not gone. This isn't that night. She's still here and she's alive.

But I've just fucking hurt her.

Mad pulls her into his lap and looks at the back of her head.

"You're okay, there's no blood." He says the last part as he looks over at me. Disbelief clouds his eyes as he looks at me like I'm a stranger.

"Can we please just stop fighting!" Violet sobs into his chest.

I take a step towards them, but feel like I'm an outsider looking in. They're the perfect couple, holding onto each other, like they were made to slot together that way.

Violet looks up at me and I wait for the stabbing pain in my heart to return as I feel her hate, but it doesn't come.

"Max, please." She stretches out her hand for me to join them. A new lifeline to drag me out of the cold depths of my torment.

"I'm so sorry," I say as I take it and wrap my arms around both of them. "Sweetheart, I never meant to hurt you. I'm so sorry."

"I know," she says quietly, then she grabs the back of my head, bringing my forehead towards hers.

"No more fighting," Mad says and I nod.

"I'm so glad you came back for me."

Mad lets out a half-laugh and says, "There's no getting rid of us now."

I look at my brother and see the person that's always been there for me, he's still here looking out for me, not leaving my side.

He never did.

I heard him by my bedside, when I was out of it in the hospital and he was there helping me through my entire recovery.

Now he's going to do the exact same for Violet and always be there for her.

"He's right. Violet, we'd both die for you, if that's what it took for you to know you're ours."

Mad scoffs, "We'll haunt your ass. Even in death you're going to be stuck with us, so you better learn to love ghost dick."

"You're serious," she says, a small smile tilting her lips up. A smile I've missed so much.

"Fucking deadly," Mad smirks.

She makes a strangled sobbing noise as she throws her arms around his neck and kisses him.

I know he's never kissed anyone before, neither of us has and he hesitates. His eyes remain wide open, whilst hers are closed as she's lost in the moment.

The more she clings to him, the quicker he opens up to her and he's wrapping his arms around her, kissing her back.

My lips tingle as I feel what he's feeling. I'm not jealous that he got to be her first, we share and feel everything.

Everything he gets to have from her, I get it as well.

I press myself tighter to her, locking her between us and she breaks off the kiss so she can bring her lips to mine.

Fuck, this feels perfect. Having her between us, right where she belongs.

Her kiss is the sweetest thing I've ever tasted and I can't believe it's taken this long to have it.

That's one mistake that's never going to happen again.

"You're so fucking perfect," Mad says as he watches her. She pulls away from my mouth and smiles up at him shyly.

"You know you're our firsts for everything as well, baby. In case you had any doubts. We've only ever wanted you," he smirks, teasing her.

"I think I get the idea now."

Mad and I share a silent understanding that this is what's right for us. There's a light in his eyes that I've not seen for so long and it's thanks to her.

Violet is our light bringing us out of the darkness, the glue that holds our broken pieces together.