With a roll of my eyes, I replied, “It’s not a statement on your masculinity. We don’t know if Silas is armed or not.”
“Trust me. I can handle this.”
Deep down, I knew he could, so I nodded. We then exited the SUV ad quickly made it up the sidewalk. With all the noise inside the house, we didn’t bother trying to mask the sound of our footsteps on the porch.
To my surprise, we found the front door open. Maksim didn’t even draw a weapon when he started into the foyer. Glancing left, I eyed the dining room to see my grandmother’s china out of the cabinet and in jagged pieces along the floor. At the thought of all the happy meals I’d eaten off of them, I couldn’t stop the sob that echoed through me.
“Easy,” Maksim murmured.
Nodding, I swiped my eyes as we followed the loud noise across the foyer to the living room. When Maksim stepped into the archway, Silas’s voice echoed through me. “Who the fuck are you?”
From Maksim’s silence, I knew he was inwardly working to regulate his speech. “It doesn’t matter who I am. What is important is you get the fuck out of here.”
Peeking around Maksim’s form, I recoiled at the sight of the man I’d once known.
His dirty clothes hung on his emaciated form while the bones in his cheeks protruded. With his dark hair and eyes, Silas had once looked so much like our father. But not anymore.
He narrowed his eyes at Masksim. “Yeah, fuck you, buddy. This is my parents’ house, so I’ll do whatever the fuck I want.”
“Silas, please,” I said.
His manic gaze flicked from Maksim to me. “Well, well, if it isn’t my sweet little sister. Or should I call her by her actual title: Mommy and Daddy’s Golden Child.”
Although I was almost thirty, his words still wounded me as they had when we were teenagers, and his mental state began rapidly deteriorating. “Can’t we please just sit for a moment and talk?”
Silas threw his hands up. “About what? How you always have to bail me out of trouble? How you’re such a success, and I’m such a screwup? Fuck, even Sammy’s holding down a job and living on his own.”
Shaking my head, I countered, “Don’t bring him into this.”
Silas rolled his eyes. “Jesus, he’s not even here, and you’re still playing his protector.”
“Someone had to be there when you were always going off on him,” I replied softly.
Pinching his eyes shut, Silas countered, “He made me crazy, always trying to be up in my face with that same goofy smile.”
Slowly, I shook my head as I stepped out from behind Maksim. “Sammy wasn’t to blame for your issues. All he ever wanted was to love you.”
As Silas’s eyes popped open, Maksim tried to grab my arm, but I slung him away. “He was so fucking needy. He sucked everything out of Mom and Dad that I needed.”
I shook my head. “They gave you so much. We all did.”
“Oh fuck you, Sarah.”
In that moment, the weight of all of his years of abuse caused something within me to snap. I went into defensive mode, but this time it wasn’t out of fear. It was out of anger.
“No. Fuckyou, Silas. Fuck you for putting Mom and Dad through hell all these years because you thought you knew better than all the specialists they took you to. Fuck you for physically and emotionally abusing Sammy and me when we sure as hell didn’t deserve it.”
I sucked in a ragged breath. “But most of all, fuck you for constantly fucking up my life, you selfish prick!”
The words had barely left my lips when I deeply regretted them. Fighting with Silas was wrong because we weren’t on an equal playing field because of his illness. Even when he refused his medicine and used drugs, it all led back to his disease.
Just as I was about to apologize, his palm cracked against my cheek.
“Fuck you, cunt.”
I’d barely brought my hand up to cup my aching cheek when a roar came out of Maksim. The next thing I knew, he launched himself at Silas, wrapping his hand around his throat before slamming him into the wall.
“Maksim, no!”
