“People love the idea of you and the carefully curated false images you project,” he corrected, and though the words were cruel, his tone had lightened in a poor attempt to make it seem like he was only teasing in good fun.
He was not.
Baikal Void could cut a person down with nothing more than his tongue, and when he was in the mood to do it, no one was safe from his wrath, not even family.
“The reason you’re so bent out of shape about Rabbit and I is because you’ve never had a relationship more meaningful than a one-night stand. Your dark empathy can only—”
“And this is where we put this ever so thrilling chat to an end.” Kazimir didn’t like talking about the things that had gone on in his childhood, or how they’d helped form him into the person he was today. Which his cousin very well knew. “Throwing that diagnosis in my face? Low blow, even for you.”
“Shouldn’t talk shit about my Possessio.”
“I didn’t—” Kaz blew out a breath. “Fine. Whatever.”
“You’re sulking again.”
“Fuck you.”
“Find someone else to stick your dick in,” Baikal said. “Want to know why I’m so satisfied with mylittle bunny, cousin? Try to get over yourself long enough to give finding the one a try. My bet’s you can’t.”
He bristled. “If you can do it, of course I can too. How hard could it be?”
Baikal grunted through the line. “For you? Nearly impossible. There’s a reason I’m the Dominus and you’re just the underboss, cousin. You’ll never be as good as me.”
“That’s—”
Someone called Kal’s name, and though it was muffled, it was obvious it was Rabbit a second later when without so much as a goodbye, the Dominus hung up.
“Fucker!” Kazimir ripped the earbud out of his right ear and almost chucked it into the street before he got a hold of himself.
“Temper,” Flix clicked his tongue. “He’s right, you know? Your tendencies make you good for the underboss job, but make it impossible for you to properly connect with the people around you enough to lead.”
“You couldn’t even hear everything he said.” Kazimir barely resisted the urge to break the other guy’s nose. The two of them had been friends for a while, but that didn’t mean he’d be opposed to causing him bodily harm. “I don’t have a problem connecting with people either, for your information.”
Flix shrugged. “Don’t need to have. You only act this way when he pushes your buttons. Brought up your diagnosis again, didn’t he?”
“Stop throwing that word around like it’s something I picked up off the street one day and carried home.” Kazimir had not and would not have chosen this life if he’d been given the chance. As it were, it turns out that when your mom skips out on you before you turn one and your dad is too busy working for a criminal ring and running a conglomerate, you develop certain…problems.
It didn’t help that he’d been trained in deception and combat, taught how to bend those around him to his will without batting an eyelash while doing so. Kaz had quickly thrown everything he’d had into things, excelling immediately. Though they’d trained alongside one another, things for Baikal had gone a bit differently.
In the beginning, when they were ordered to hurt, maim, or kill someone, Baikal asked for details. He wanted explanations, wanted to understand why the person was being punished and decide if the punishment fit the crime.
Kaz had wanted that too, but for very different reasons.
Baikal Void could connect with those around him on an emotional level. Even if he chose not to give in to those feelings, he could still relate and understand.
Kazimir Ambrose, however, struggled with forming those types of bonds. He grasped basic emotional responses—could tell when someone was sad, and knew what sadness felt like—but he couldn’t apply those emotions to himself. A sad person was a sad person. Didn’t mean Kazimir had to feel sad seeing it.
Lack of a deeper sense of empathy. That’s what the doctor had told them when Kazimir’s father had ordered the tests done on him during one of the few instances he’d bothered paying his one and only offspring any attention. Kaz had cognitive empathy, took in the cues of those around him and understood what they were feeling, it was just he didn’t allow their emotions to affecthisemotions.
So what if Kaz didn’t feel bad when he saw a little old lady slip and split her head open on the pavement? If the need called for it, he could fake it convincingly enough. It only really became an issue after time had passed to become noticeable, and even then, it was only those who paid attention that caught on. He’d never cost the Brumal anything because of what he was.
“Relax,” Flix clapped him on the back and left his hand resting there for a moment longer than Kaz was comfortable with. “Your cousin was a major prick before he met Trace too, remember? Not to mention the Imperial Prince. That guy's temper has seriously leveled since he hooked up with that Academy Cadet. You’ll find your thing eventually.”
“My thing?”
“Yeah. You know. That thing that helps make you feel centered and all that other crap. The thing.”
Kazimir’s eyes narrowed. “I can’t help but notice you’re implying I need to find an outlet that’s an object, and not a person.”
