Page 75 of Maddening Fixation

Then someone else appeared.

Another teenage boy.

Irish.

About Romeo’s height.

I wouldn’t learn until years later that he was Sergei Flynn.

Romeo’s younger half-brother.

The son of his grandfather’s mistress.

Yet, despite his birth, Sergei was the cherished one—the child the Flynn family adored, protected, and favored without question.

While Romeo...

Romeo was the one they neglected, despised, and made suffer.

He approached from behind so quietly that Romeo never heard him.

Without warning...

He shoved him.

Hard.

Romeo pitched forward into the deeper part of the lake.

The splash echoed across the water.

For a heartbeat...

Nothing happened.

Then frantic arms broke the surface.

He was drowning.

The other boy merely watched.

A slow, satisfied smirk crossed his face.

Then he turned his back...

...and walked away.

As though he had simply discarded something he no longer wanted.

“Help!”

Romeo’s voice barely carried across the water before another wave swallowed it.

No one heard him.

The orchestra inside the ballroom drowned out every desperate cry.

The adults continued laughing, drinking, and dancing.