All my life, I’d pretended to be perfect. And all my life, I’d nursed the truth inside that I was far from it. The Hawks were crazy—there was no other explanation for their fixation on something so far in the past—but they were passionate about it.
Passion had trickled from my world as if every dress and collection had been vampiric—sucking my will to keep striving for greatness in my designs.
If you felt this strongly about it, maybe you should’ve gone on holiday. Had a break from being a Weaver.
But that was the thing. I would never have admitted it to myself, because I would never have recognised it. My vertigo spells, my lacklustre acquiescence of my father’s wishes—I couldn’t see how lost I was from my true self. I’d never been given the time to figure out who I was—only what was expected of a daughter born into the Weaver empire.
The beauty of distance meant I saw my life without being immersed in it. It all boiled down to the fact I’d never had anything of my own. I’d shared my life with a twin, who I positively adored, but who outshone me in every way. I’d been drowning with self-doubt and nervousness. I’d crippled my instincts and skills, terrified of letting others down.
Oh, my God.
I clutched the phone harder.
I’m a better person away from the people who love me most.
That meant I excelled while living with people who hated me.
It was fucked up.
It didn’t make sense.
But how could I argue against something that was true?
VtheMan: I know everything, Threads, and I’m coming for you. I’ll bring the army. I’ll kidnap the fucking Queen if it means I’ll get you free. Just stay alive, sister. I’m coming.
My attention reverted back to the current issue.
Vaughn.
Father must’ve told him what happened. I didn’t know how much he shared—hell, I didn’t really know how much he even knew himself—but I feared for my brother. I feared for myself.
Vaughn was volatile and likely to do anything to get me back. Every day since I was born, I let him baby me, protect me from life experiences I really should’ve faced rather than hide from. That protectiveness sometimes came across as too much, and before, I secretly loved it. I loved being so significant to someone—their entire reason for living.
But everything had changed.
I’m not the same person I was a few days ago.
If I was bluntly honest, our relationship seemed a little much now. Blurring lines that had kept me firmly in my place as daughter and sister with no need to spread my wings and hurl myself from the nest.
“Get up.” Jethro paced to the huge windows, wrenching open a sash pane letting the pretty English morning into the stuffy room. I breathed deeply as sunshine bounced around, merrily painting corpses of winged creatures.
Yesterday, I’d named some of the prettier ones. Snowdrop, Iceberg, and Glacier were all addressed in honour of their tormentor and mine.
I needed to reply to Vaughn, but I tucked the phone beneath the quilt, eyeing up my nemesis. “Nice to see you, too.”
His nostrils flared. “Don’t get uppity, Ms. Weaver. I don’t have time for nonsense.”
I stretched, deliberately taunting him. “Nonsense? You can’t talk. All of this Weaver and Hawk charade is utter nonsense.”
Jethro stomped over. Dressed in beige corduroys and black shirt, he looked as if he had a meeting with his local backgammon club. The requisite diamond pin glinted on his lapel. “Shut up and get out of bed. Now.”
My heart thundered. His golden eyes were icy and steadfast.
The intensity and raw visceral desire I’d seen in the forest was gone. Hope fizzled into dirty bubbles in my chest. I’d thought we’d climbed to a new dimension with what happened in the woods. I thought I’d showed him that he couldn’t undermine me without undermining himself.
How wrong I’d been.
Squinting in the sun, I whispered, “What did you do?”
He reared back as if I’d slapped him. “Excuse me?”
Shuffling in the covers, I eyed him closer, trying to figure out what had changed. Nothing outward looked different. He was the perfect resemblance of a country gentleman. But his tone was smooth as silk and just as unbreakable.
“You’ve done something. A few nights ago you looked human…now…”
“Now?”
I scowled. “Now you just look like the cold-hearted robot who came for me at my runway show.”
Before he could answer, another vital question popped into my head. “Why now?”
“What?” His face twisted into a glower. “That doesn’t even make sense. Your questions are really starting to grate on my nerves, Ms. Weaver.” Running a hand through his hair, he said quietly, “If you rephrase that into a coherent sentence, I might answer, if it means you’ll kindly get out of bed.”
There he went all pomp and ceremony again. No curses. No snapping. No spikes of emotion of any kind.
He stayed away to distance himself, regroup.
I had affected him. So much so, he’d needed three nights to deal with it.
A hot douse of power shot through my veins.
“Why did you leave me on my own for days?” I held up a hand. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining. The wait-staff did an impeccable job of keeping me fed, and the downtime was rather welcome after the manic few years I’ve had travelling and working non-stop, but it is a little odd.”
He sedately placed his hands into his corduroy pockets. His eyes were completely unreadable—it was like trying to decipher a damn vault. “Please, tell me what you find so odd. Then perhaps I can help you.”
If I hadn’t seen the passionate man in the forest—if I hadn’t wrapped my lips around his throbbing cock and swallowed his cum—I might’ve shrunk back in reprimand. I might’ve feared the silence more than his temper, because it heralded something terrible coming.
But now…now I saw it for what it was.
It’s a coping mechanism.
We all had them. Mine was permitting my father and brother complete control over me. My only freedom from that was running until I passed out on my treadmill.
Jethro didn’t run, but he did use something extremely effective to push aside the tangled emotions I knew he felt and embraced the glacier he pretended to be.
“Never mind,” I whispered. “I understand.”
Beneath the power in my veins, a small cloud of depression settled. I’d worked hard breaking his arctic exterior. I’d thrown my all into showing him pleasure that he could find by giving in to me. The fact he’d been so affected that he’d had to shut down and hide should’ve pleased me.