I have my eyes on Lucifer when I answer, “I’m just feeling like something’s happened to us, and I’m not feeling so sure that Lucifer is a good fit for my sister anymore.”
Even though I’m being a shit, I mean what I said. Lucifer won’t let Sid out of his sight. We’re falling apart. We have been ever since…Sacrificium. Since we had to look at ourselves in the fucking mirror for the first time in a while, and turns out, we don’t like a damn thing we see.
“You think Jeremiah Rain is a good fucking fit for your sister, Mav?” Lucifer snarls, pushing up to his feet. He moves slowly, but I see his fists. I see that vein in his neck, just over top his skeleton bandana. “You think she’s gonna survive his hands?”
“Stop, Luce,” Atlas says.
Cain is still staring at the back of Lucifer’s head and Ezra is watching everything as if he’s on high alert. As if he’s not been drinking from that flask all night.
“Actually, I’m starting to think his hands can’t possibly be any worse than yours. And the way you left Sid last night, when it counted—”
“You accusing me of something, Mav? If so, why don’t you fucking spell it out for me instead of speaking in metaphors.”
I smile at him, at his little dig at my love of poetry. At least I can fucking read. He might’ve graduated top of our class, but I’m still not sure his father didn’t have something to do with that. “You got Sid a car yet, bro?”
He stiffens. “What I buy for my wife isn’t any of your fucking business—”
“Why doesn’t Sid have a car?” Cain asks quietly.
Lucifer steps back and turns to the side so he can see all of us. “Are you all seriously questioning me about my own fucking family right now?”
“We’re all a family,” Ezra says, a hard edge to his voice.
Lucifer runs his thumb over his mouth, drops his hand. “Fuck you. All of you.”
Atlas blows out a breath. “Look, Luce, I think you’re going through some shit and maybe you should just talk to us about it.” He adjusts his hat again, a nervous habit. “We’re here for you, okay? I know you just…ya know, everything with your dad and shit….”
Lucifer stares at Atlas as if he’s grown another fucking head. “You don’t know shit about my dad.”
At that, I can’t keep quiet, but I’m surprised to see that Ezra, too, stands to his feet, just as I do, his jaw set.
“Newsflash, motherfucker,” I spit out before Ez can speak, “you’re not the only one with a shitty fucking childhood.”
“You have no idea what my childhood was like—”
“You think you know mine?” I step around the pew, coming to stand in front of him. Cain stands up, at Lucifer’s back, and Ezra and Atlas are behind me. “You think you know shit about me? Tell me something, Luce. Tell me how I got to be called Mayhem.”
Lucifer snorts. “This sounds too much like a ‘Do you want to know how I got these scars?’ type story, and honestly, Mav, no, I don’t want to fucking know.” He takes a breath, and something in his gaze softens. “I know since Malachi—”
“Don’t you fucking dare.” I don’t want to hear that name. I don’t want to think about him. Talk about him. They only know half the story. The half where I pushed my own brother off the fucking roof of my house.
“You guys are stupid,” Cain says quietly behind Lucifer’s back. “We’ve known each other since we were born. We’ve been in this since we were born. We all know that we all got fucked up.” Then he looks to me. “But you, Mav? You need to leave Ella alone.”
“The fuck are you talking about?” I ask, caught off guard, my pulse still flying from wanting to bust Lucifer’s fucking lip.
Cain laughs quietly, shaking his head and slipping his hands into his pockets. He looks like a damn Arabian billionaire, which I guess he is. He’s always possessed more common sense than the rest of though, so I let him finish. “It’s obvious.” He nods toward me, stepping up beside Lucifer. “You’re falling for her.”
“How in the actual fuck is that obvious?”
Lucifer answers before Cain can. “Jeremiah Rain knows about her, which means he’s fucking watching us. Looking for our weak spots. You threw him into a pool table last night and nearly choked him to death for her, and if I recall correctly, last time you saw him, you fucking saved his life.” He cracks his knuckles. “Tell me you don’t feel something for her.”
I don’t answer him. He doesn’t know shit about me, or her. Us.
Cain sighs. “I hate to say it, but your father was right, Mav. You need to deal with Ria, and not get entangled with any steady pussy until then.”
I feel my jaw clench at the way he refers to Ella, but I fight back that impulse. That desire to stand up for her. It’ll only prove them right. And last night, when Jeremiah Rain had his mouth on her, when I was elbowing my way through the crowded bar, I could’ve killed him. I could’ve dug my nails into that still-healing wound I’m sure he’s got on his stomach and pulled out his fucking intestines.
But I can’t tell them that. I feel like I can’t tell them anything anymore.
“Let’s just make it to Noctem, where we can all let this shit out. Come together again.” Cain claps Lucifer on the shoulder, nearly making him topple to the damn floor. “Okay?”
Slowly, Lucifer nods.
Atlas grumbles his agreement. Ezra, too.
But I don’t. Not yet. I look at Lucifer, remembering how close we were just a few days ago, my mouth on his. “Luce, I know you’re dealing with shit,” I say quietly, “but Sid is, too. And you need to be there for her. But stop fucking suffocating her.”
He doesn’t look at me, but Cain squeezes his shoulder, and then, slowly, he nods.
I tear my eyes away from him, feeling my chest tighten at things he doesn’t know. At the way he’s probably going to hate me when this is all over. And some sick part of me? Some sick part of me is looking forward to it. He can’t expect to act just like his brother, his real brother, and not suffer the consequences. My sister deserves better.
Both of them.
Chapter Seventeen
Over a week after the fight at the bar, and I can’t sleep. Maverick is in bed beside me, his mouth open as he breathes slowly, his bare chest rising and falling in the dim light from the alarm clock on his side of the bed.
I don’t even know why he has a clock.
He doesn’t seem to need to get up at any specific time. Then again, neither do I. I haven’t gotten a call back from any job I’ve applied for. And my mother hasn’t called either.
I baked more cookies while he was out, meeting up with his friends, just like I did last Sunday. I cleaned up the kitchen, although I feel certain he’s got a housekeeper because the place is usually spotless. He’s not messy exactly, but he doesn’t really seem like the cleaning type.
He likes to read.
His office is lined with shelves, each one packed. Psychology, poetry, classics. Many of the pages of his books are dog-eared, and I pulled a few from the shelves. In a Shakespeare collection, he had a line from Richard II underlined: “I wasted time, and now doth time waste me.” The pen had been pressed hard against the page, denting it.