Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Twenty-Seven Years ago, Seven Years Old

I was stacking blocks with careful precision, testing when gravity would win over determination. Each time I rebuilt the tower, I corrected the placement of each block, so I could build it taller and taller without it toppling over. Physics was built into everything, and I wanted to understand the exact breaking point. One day, I would have wings like Dad, and I would have to figure out how to fly. It was best I learned balance and precision while I waited to get my true form.

"Addy," Mom's sudden and excited shout distracted me in a crucial moment, and the slight twitch of my hand toppled over the delicately designed four foot block tower I'd spent so much time building. "Can you come out here? I have an announcement for the whole family."

"In a minute." I yelled back. I sighed with exasperation, then squatted back down to start again. I was so close to making a structure that matched my height. So close.

" Now , Adrian." Dad's stern and gruff voice shook tension down my spine, and I stood from my blocks to meet my parents in the den without further argument. Mom was the nice one until Dad got involved. I looked between them, and my nose scrunched at the way Dad's brow was intensely furrowed, and Mom was uncharacteristically nervous.

A man I didn't know was seated on the couch. I could feel Dad's anger and Mom's unease, but nothing came through from the third person. I was told that, eventually, I'd be able to read emotions from anyone. Right now, my current magic was limited to blood relation.

I glanced between the three of them, then settled my gaze back on Mom. It wasn't just her anxiety I was feeling. There was… something else. Mom's aura was weird.

She masked it with a tight smile as she approached me and squatted down to my height. She placed her hands on my shoulders and squeezed. "Adrian, I want to introduce you to a new friend of mine."

I glanced over her shoulder, trying to process what was happening. Dad was rubbing his temples, while the stranger kept his eyes on me.

Mom stroked my hair in a soothing motion. That couldn't be good.

"Thanks to him, you're going to be a big brother." She lit up with honest excitement as she said it aloud, while Father lit with barely restrained rage. The feeling in my own gut was something more complicated.

"What?" I looked between the man and my father in utter confusion. What did this man have to do with our family?

"And now you're going to have two daddies to play with." She kept stroking my hair .

"I don't understand." I didn't. At all. How could that man make me a brother? Mom and Dad were already married. "I thought only married people could make babies." I blinked and I blinked, waiting for someone to connect the dots for me.

"I thought so, too." Dad growled, and Mom shot him a look.

"Normally that's true, but sometimes, our hearts join with others, and we can create an even bigger and more special family." She was talking to me like I was five, when I was already seven.

I glanced down at her belly, where it occurred to me what the ‘weird' aura had been. I was feeling the first traces of emotion from the brother building inside her, and they were still too vague and shapeless to come through as anything other than nausea in my stomach.

The man stood from the couch, and he walked past Dad without giving him so much as a passing glance. He approached and crouched down beside my mom. They shared a smile between them.

"I've heard so much about you." He said, but I could barely hear him over the pounding of Dad's heartbeat. "I'm looking forward to getting to know you better, Addy."

"It's Adrian, not Addy. I'm not a little kid anymore." I latched onto Dad's anger and channeled those emotions through myself to correct him. Who was he to call me that? I jerked out of Mom's grip and took a step back. "And I don't want to know you or have a little brother. "

A tinge of relief sparked in Dad's emotions, and I was glad I could put it there. I didn't understand the situation, but I could at least modify my behavior to not make it worse.

"This might be too much for him right now." Dad came to my defense, while I was coming to his.

The stranger stood and glanced over his shoulder at my father. He nodded in agreement. "That's fine. We'll have many, many years to sort all this out."

Dad flinched, and Mom sighed.

She stood and approached my father, where she placed a soft kiss on his lips. "We will have many, many, many years." She whispered at a barely audible volume. "I'm sure we can all make this work." Another kiss. The man said nothing. Dad drew a slow breath through his nose, and his strained attempt at calming himself was making me more uneasy than reassured.

Mom rubbed her belly, and despite any concern she showed on her face, I could still feel the bliss that filled her every time she thought about the life she was carrying.

Mom was happy she was pregnant. She'd mentioned wanting another child a thousand times, and I'd felt the intensity of her sadness every time my parents sat at the dining table and talked about another failed pregnancy test. I'd heard them talk about trying something different. I just didn't realize she'd meant with a man who wasn't my father.

I felt a wet, hot fluid dribble down my cheek. I was still so overwhelmed by everyone else's feelings, I hadn't had a chance to figure out my own. Judging by my tears, my body chose a reaction for me .

"I don't understand." I muttered again, my voice breaking on the last word. The stranger looked to my mom, and she shook her head again.

"It's okay, baby." She attempted to reassure me. "I'm sure you'll feel differently once you meet little Marcus."

Dragging my hand down my face, I sank into my arm chair in my dark living room, while old, pained memories bled through my brain.

Marcus was a problem. Ordinarily I simply found him mildly annoying, but he also wasn't ordinarily taking one of my classes, spending time with a woman who he'd mixed me up with, and placing mating marks on another person. I'd never known him to pursue a singular woman, but then, I'd never taken the time to know him either. As adamantly as I'd avoided him year after year, he was a constant in my life, and even now he was always trying to get my attention.

I hadn't thought back on the day mother confessed she was pregnant in ages. I didn't know what had prompted the memory, for that matter. I slumped forward and fisted my hair, recalling the look on father's face as she introduced the vampire who sired the child, and I rubbed at my temples as I visualized the first time I'd seen my baby half-brother being cradled by my mother. I envisioned, all too vividly, the way my kin's emotions flowed freely and intensely into my young body, before I knew how to block out the feelings of others.

I'd hated him for that. I'd hated him for so many things that were completely outside his control, and I knew that wasn't fair. But it didn't change that his existence had always been maddening for me. He tried to be my friend growing up, but I hadn't been receptive to it. Every time he'd come up to me, pleading, seeing his big brother with admiration and hope, I recoiled and pushed him away, determined to not fall for the charm of an Emery like my mother had.

Love was what I'd been rejecting then. By the time I was old enough to realize the error of my ways, our relationship was too warped and tainted to repair.

As a result, I would have been happy to go our separate ways as we came into adulthood, but he couldn't let it lie. The irony was that he'd become the only person whose emotions I couldn't read anymore. Somewhere along the line, when he'd come into puberty and his vampire and Alpha Leo shifter gifts fully awakened in his soul, I'd lost that connection.

No longer being bombarded by his feelings had calmed some of my anger, but I'd lost any chance of fixing things by that point. I'd already come to rely on my gifts to temper my interactions with others, and when the door to his heart closed, I'd lost any ability to function around him with civility.

I just wished back then that Mother had told me the reason for her affair was because my father had become infertile as a side effect of an incubus successfully impregnating another species. It would have made a world of difference in my attitude if I'd known my father had agreed to finding an outside donor, even if he hadn't been prepared for how much jealousy it would bring out in him.

No, knowing that sooner probably wouldn't have changed much for me, really. I felt everything too strongly to think rationally, and they had no idea how much the overload of emotion they subjected me to would affect my ability to form trust and relationships.

Without realizing it, they taught me to hide my own emotions in favor of the more acceptable emotions of others. To avoid punishment, I started feeding on other's sensibilities and trying to match an energy that won over the room. It made teaching easier, as I could always pull from one of my enthusiastic students to create an upbeat and level headed persona in front of a class.

But when I was alone, I only had myself and my real, true feelings to sink into. It was peace and agony at the same time. There had only been two people in my life who could take that mask from me while in their presence—two people who forced me to interact with them honestly, and didn't offer a safer emotion I could mimic.

One being him.

The other… her.

Which was perhaps why, on this Sunday night, I was sitting alone in my home in a dark room, my fingers threaded through my hair, and my stress levels at an unreasonable peak.

I reached for my phone, then hesitated, uncertain what I'd intended to do with it. Was I going to call Marcus and ask how his date went? I didn't care about that. Not him, anyway. I didn't like how involved he'd become in my life since Lila showed up. This obnoxious little link between us wasn't going to be what made us bond as brothers after so many years of bad blood.

I had to admit, he'd manipulated this situation masterfully, and I had no real recourse against him. Though many of my weaknesses were his as well, he was confident that I would never stoop to his level, and I couldn't say he was wrong to be. Unlike my psychotic brother, I didn't see living, breathing, sentient beings as disposable objects, whether they were human, my energy source, or something else entirely.

Not anymore.

I considered calling Lila instead, only to realize I'd never gotten her number. I didn't treat her cordially enough for that, and asking her for it would have given her hope. It would be a violation of every code of conduct to use my position of power over her to get her phone number for personal use.

I laughed aloud at the implication. Personal use. Is that what this was now?

I'd already taken her for personal use. A simple phone call or text message would have been sweet by comparison.

I sighed and closed my eyes, while I massaged the bridge of my nose in an effort to stave off a deserved headache.

Happening upon her and Marcus in the hot springs had been somehow both my worst nightmare and expected carnage in the same breath. I'd not done anything, even as her pheromones and feelings exploded through my brain, and I'd been thankful for the small act of resistance I'd been able to uphold despite .

Marking her had given me a degree of control in the sense that I could pick up on her emotions enough to feast on that lust and desire from a safe distance. Additionally, knowing my mate was safe and content, disregarding the source of those feelings, was enough to keep me grounded. I wouldn't have been nearly as docile if she'd been in legitimate distress or danger, but I'd have been worse than the Capricorn had I stepped into that pool and let myself turn. Nowadays, I had more restraint and discipline than my brother ever would.

Vampires never saw a need for discipline, after all. Why would a blood parasite worry about their hosts?

I stood from my sofa and paced. Only one month separated every full moon, and with already a week down, the moon of Pisces would be here entirely too quickly. That trigger was fairly specific, but it could be easily hit under the wrong circumstance. I wondered what the chances were of her avoiding both of us that night?

Unlikely. Not without intervention.

In this case, I might just have to make sure it's my intervention that changes her course and not his.