Total pages in book: 188
Estimated words: 179812 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 899(@200wpm)___ 719(@250wpm)___ 599(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 179812 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 899(@200wpm)___ 719(@250wpm)___ 599(@300wpm)
With that, I turn around and resume walking away and enter the house and walk down the hallway.
I stop at one of the doors; my childhood room where I was crashing while I was in town. I open the door and there she is, on the bed. Her red hair fanned out on the pillow, her small form on her back and under the covers, sleeping. She wanted to go home after her bitch of a mother left and she told us the rest of the story about how our parents met each other. But Callie along with Tempest and Wyn convinced her to stay here. Tomorrow morning, we’ll all go to the hospital together to see Snow.
Conrad was wrong. I don’t need to stay away from her, she needs to stay away from me.
Because these past three weeks that I was away from her, I realized something. When I’m with her, I can breathe. I can breathe easy. Which is so strange because I didn’t even know my breaths were difficult. That all my life I’ve been breathing like there’s something stuck in my throat.
With her, I can focus. I don’t hear the world’s bullshit about my game, about my comeback. Something I think I was starting to believe myself. I didn’t even realize it until I saw her belief in me. I don’t hear my siblings worry and their doubts over me, something that I never ever wanted.
When I’m with her, I feel free. And freedom is addictive.
She is addictive. And I’ve had a taste.
Which means I’ll do anything to have that taste again. I’ll destroy everything in my path, go behind everyone’s back. I’ll betray anyone. I’ll lie, cheat, steal, do any fucking thing to have her again. To get to touch her, smell her. Watch her laugh and catch her shy smile. To take things from her she isn’t willing to give and make her like it. I’ll do anything to make her, mold her, bend her to my will.
But the thing is that’s all I can do.
I can take things from her like I did that night, use her, but I don’t have anything to give. She calls me toxic, doesn’t she? She’s right. I have poison in my veins. A never-ending bitterness, sourness, this growing restlessness that makes me want to stay away from my own twin brother. That makes me unhappy and angry with my own family, isolated in my own family. All because I fell in goddamn love once and don’t know how to get back up.
I don’t know how to get back up without her.
But I wouldn’t care about any of that, what I can or can’t give her, what she deserves. I’d just use her and use her and fucking use her until I’m done. Until all my pain is gone and I’m numb. Like the drug she is.
They call me the Wrecking Thorn because I’m a wrecking ball on the field, never stopping, never letting anyone stand in the way of my goal. But that’s not true anymore. I’m not the Wrecking Thorn because of my game. I’m the Wrecking Thorn because I’ll destroy everything in my path to get to her.
And that’s not a good thing for her.
Chapter Seventeen
I’m moving into the Thorne house.
I can’t even believe I’m saying this, because it doesn’t seem real. It feels like a dream I had when I was twelve. When I found out about them for the first time and would see them around town. I wanted to move into their house back then and be a part of their family, me and Snow. But of course, that was crazy.
As crazy as this is. As crazy as the past couple of weeks have been.
First and foremost, my sister is fine. Thanks to the people I went to for help. I knew it was a lot to ask for. Not only because they hardly knew me, and whatever they knew, they knew through Callie. But also, because they all mostly have families now, plus the season was—is—coming up and they all needed to be in top form for that.
But they never asked any questions or raised any objections. They all got tested and Conrad turned out to be the only match. Since Snow’s condition was dire, they wanted to do the surgery as soon as possible. But the hospital in Bardstown was already at capacity, so they couldn’t find an opening as quickly as they had wanted. So Conrad took charge, and at his insistence, they transferred Snow to a hospital in New York City that was able to fit her in right away. And now my sister is recovering and getting better every day. Conrad too, by the way. He’s already back at work and prepping to go on the road.
I guess I should’ve known or at least guessed that they wouldn’t raise concerns over helping Snow after how they defended me against my mother. How all the brothers collectively formed a wall between her and me, and all my friends and my stepsister held onto me to keep me standing. Like they said, I was their family, their own.