Somethingabout the way both of them seem to dodge around the real reason I needed to visit is why I drag myself to Anastasia’s home for dinner the next evening. Seeing Faina is the top of my list, and deep down, I know I shouldn’t have avoided her, but the moment I stepped off the plane in New York, it was like I couldn’t breathe.
I don’t want to rely on her as my air. She deserves a man stronger than that, but maybe she can help me get there.
The mansion looks exactly as I remember it, only with more security than I’ve ever seen. I’m IDed and fingerprinted at the gate and again at a second check-in further up the drive. After the Gifford explosion, I don’t blame Anastasia for being cautious, but the third check-in at the last gate before the house causes issues. They want to take my gun, and we stand there arguing for fifteen minutes before someone on the other end of the radio asks the guard to let me pass.
I approach the front door and attempt to smooth out the rumpled shirt I dragged from my unpacked bag. Looking semi-presentable, I rehearse my apology as I knock.
I’m sorry. Coming back here felt a little bit like dying all over again and facing a city without my family feels impossible so I needed time. And I was scared of being weak in front of you so I was selfish and took time without talking to you. You didn’t deserve it.
Faina might understand and if she doesn’t, then I’ll spend the rest of my time making it up to her.
It was selfish, I know, but even as I rehearse the apology and try to anticipate her responses, something in my soul feels soothed already.
The door slowly swings open and my lips part with my apology clinging to the tip of my tongue as I expect to see Faina standing there with her familiar sharp expression.
But it’s not Faina standing there holding the door open with a small, nervous smile on his lips.
It’s Cormac.
The world around me freezes as we become suspended in time while I stare in the achingly familiar eyes of my dead older brother.
Only he’s not dead.
And his eyes aren’t familiar. His right eye is milky and pale with a thick, warped scar cutting from the middle of his forehead, across his eye, and down to his cheek which looks more sunken than his left one. Even his smile, small as it is, isn’t lifting on the left side of his face. His hair is thin and his skin pale. He looks like a ghost standing before me and I can’t breathe.
I can’t think.
He’s thinner than the last time I saw him, like someone’s tried to draw him from memory and they’re missing all the parts that make him unique while getting a general idea of what he looks like.
Cormac leans against the door and blinks slowly, then his lips move, but whatever he says doesn’t reach me through the pounding sound of my own heartbeat drumming in my ears like my end of days is fast approaching.
He’s alive.
He’s alive?
How thefuckis he alive?
No, this can’t be possible. Did I die? Did Faina and I die on the flight back to New York and this is some kind of fucked up afterlife where the remains of my brother wait for me? It’s the only thing that makes sense.
“Cian?” He says my name, and the sound of his voice hits like a physical blow to the chest.
My heart squeezes as if those words have formed a fist and they’re prying me open for all to see. Tears begin to fill my eyes as I refuse to blink in case this mirage of my brother fades away and only a similar-looking guard stands there instead.
Then he reaches for me. I flinch back on reflex but Cormac doesn’t stop. He keeps reaching until his hand touches my arm. I expect it to phase right through but instead his firm, warm hand closes around my elbow.
He’s real.
“You’re real?” I croak hoarsely. My eyes flicker and tears spill down my cheeks while Cormac remains standing in front of me. “How? How are you real? How is this…?”
It doesn’t make sense. Nothing makes sense. My gut lurches like I’m falling with nothing to catch me and when Cormac opens his mouth to speak again, the sound tears right through me.
“Cian. I’m so sorry.”
He’ssorry?
He’s fucking sorry?
I lash out before I can stop myself, and my fist collides with his jaw, but it’s like I punched a brick wall, and pain explodes through my knuckles and forearm. It angers me, so I punch him again, and this time, I hit the soft flesh of his shoulder.
