He was steady on his feet, eyeballing me like I was a piece of shit he’d just stepped in. “I really don’t like you,” he said flatly. “This reality … I don’t want it. Why the fuck do you think I drink?”
“So you don’t have to deal with things like the rest of us!” I sniped back. “Newsflash, buddy, you don’t just get to check out because shit is hard. The gods are almost loose again. We’re talking days … or hours at this point. Who do you think they’ll come after the second they get out and kill all of those on the front line?”
His gaze was steely; I preferred it to the glazed-over look he’d been rocking recently.
“Us,” I reminded him. “We are what they want. Our power. Our abilities. And right now, you’re a hot fucking mess that will be taken in by those dickhead-deities in seconds. I can already tell that you’re so weak you’d roll on us in a heartbeat and damn the entire freaking world.”
Again. I wanted to add but didn’t.
Connor had been helping the gods behind the scenes for many years. Leading the Arterians, a now defunct secret group of Atlantean warriors. Even if he didn’t fully understand what he was helping the gods do, he still did it. He was weak, and that was the worst character flaw to have in this fight against power hungry deities.
I stepped closer. “Here’s a reality check ... I’m not letting you roll on us again. I don’t care what I have to do. Genetically, we’re siblings. Genetically, I know you must have some strength of character in there.” I growled at him. “Fucking find it.”
His jaw was set, that look of disdain still boring into me, and it was clear that my current tactic was not reaching him. My patience was at its limit, but I decided to give it one more shot, and approach him in a different way.
“Talk to me, Connor,” I said, letting whatever iota of concern I could muster filter into my voice. “It can’t just be the god situation that has you drinking … there has to be more to it?”
His jaw twitched and his mouth opened, but then he slammed it shut and shook his head. “I’m not doing this with you. You don’t really care. You’ve never even acknowledged that I’m your brother outside of that lovely ‘genetically we are siblings’ statement from a second ago.”
Guilt ripped through my gut again, leaving a slightly sick feeling behind. He hadn’t said it with any emphasis, more like he was just stating a fact, but there was resignation in his voice. He knew my “concern” right now was just a front to get information from him.
“You did a lot of shitty things. You hurt me, you took from me,” I reminded him. “But if it makes you feel any better, I’ve started thinking of you as my brother, even when I’m mad at you.” This was the truth.
I took another step closer and he didn’t back up, eyeing me warily. “You consider me to be your brother?” he asked, voice so low I almost missed the question. “Family?”
I nodded. “Yes. You’re my family, whether I want you to be or not. Our parents, they’re evil…” I sighed. “But I’m hoping that you’re not the same. I have this stupid hope that someday, if we can win this war, we might actually have a relationship. I want to believe there’s good in you.”
He swallowed so hard I could see his throat working. “I did it for family,” he choked out. “To finally have a true family. A place to belong. Then we met our parents…” He shrugged. “And you know how that went. Not exactly the happy family reunion I envisioned.”
Understatement of the century.I was finally starting to understand why he’d been acting the way he had. It all made sense now, especially his actions recently. He was grieving. For a lost dream.
“You wanted a family,” I breathed, and my chest hurt, because that’s all I’d ever wanted in my life too. And then I’d met Asher, and the Atlantean five, and Ilia and Larissa. Even Louis and Princeps Jones, who’d both been like father figures to me.
They’d become my family and I was never alone or lonely anymore. I hadn’t needed our parents. But Connor didn’t have any of that.
“You and Asher used to be friends,” I reminded him. “You pulled away from everyone in this crazy pursuit of a family. A family that could have been part of your life all along…”
He was never one of the Atlantean-five, but piecing together what I’d learned about the guys and their relationships, he could have been part of it. He’d chosen to take a different path.
“Stand with me, Connor,” I said, reaching out my hand to him. The first time I’d offered myself freely to him. “Help me save the world, and then we’ll work on our family. We’ll work on you and me.”
He stared at my hand, hesitation on his face as he fought against self-preservation … and his need for someone to give a fuck about him. I’d clearly hurt him in the past when I dismissed him, probably not my finest moment, but he also wasn’t completely blameless.
He placed his hand in mine, and the second my fingers closed around his, energy flared between us. Asher must have felt the jump in my power, because he was back in the ocean room in a heartbeat, racing toward us. He couldn’t get any closer because there were visible arcs of power spreading around Connor and me.
You okay, Maddi?
His voice washing through my mind was a soothing balm to my frazzled nerves.
All good. I think this is the connection. Our energy is … curious.
Connor didn’t fight me. If anything, he was urging the connection forward, and I squelched the small part of me that wondered if he hadn’t been playing me all along. We both had a long way to go in building any sort of trust. But we had to start somewhere.
We just needed time. The one commodity I was basically out of.
When our energy was satisfied, curiosity sated, we were released from the hold. “I can sense you,” Connor said, almost in awe. “Nothing crazy, just a small sliver of your power. Like I’d know if you were in trouble or not.”
I nodded. “Yes. I feel the same sliver from you.”
