Unlike me, Maya thrives on being the star of the show. She’s wearing a white chiffon princess dress with high heels that add unnecessary height to her already long legs. Perfect blonde curls fall down her back, teasing at the bare skin beneath it. As is customary on our birthday, I’m wearing the black version of her dress with knee-length leather boots. My hair is tied in pigtails intertwined with blue ribbons.
This is the first year we’re celebrating our birthday without our parents. Mum and Dad offered to come, but Maya said she wants to celebrate with friends. I didn’t encourage them either, because I could and would blurt out everything about the chaos that’s been happening in my life lately.
Still, Mom and Dad sent us gifts and were the first to wish us a happy birthday. They told us they loved us and that we were the brightest stars of their lives.
Niko, Kill, and Gareth threw us a massive party in the Heathens' mansion. Everyone from TKU and their next of kin have flocked to the extravagance of money and blinding power.
They look up to my brother, cousins, and Jeremy as if they’re celebrities. The Heathens’ nonnegotiable power and untouchable vibe are everything they want to be. Mom has always told me that power is a dangerous game if you don’t know how to play it.
The Heathens, led by Jeremy, definitely do.
And that type of charisma attracts people like a magnet. This is why the hall downstairs brims with people, alcohol, and loud trendy music
Maya is dancing with a group of her fake friends of the week, taking pictures, and chugging alcohol. Technically, we’re supposed to wait until we’re twenty-one, but we’ve been drinking since last year. Besides, it’s the UK, and the legal drinking age here is eighteen.
Niko doesn’t seem to mind either. I’m sitting between him and Kill on a sofa on the upper floor. From our position, we can overlook the entire party while being detached from it.
I’d rather go to the chess club or have a birthday talk with my plants instead of taking part in this mindless celebration.
Worse, a part of me sees it as an anniversary of being a powerless mute. It’s been nearly eleven years already and there’s still that dooming thought that I’ll never be able to speak again.
Here’s to another year of complete silence, I tell myself as I take a sip of foul-tasting beer.
I don’t particularly like alcohol, and I’m such an embarrassing lightweight, but I need to shut off my brain tonight.
Especially since it’s been on high alert ever since last week when Landon declared that he’d let me go. He hasn’t tried to contact me from a thousand numbers, hasn’t cornered me again, and hasn’t even gone to the chess club.
I’ve been there almost every day to play against Mr. Whitby, but I was told Landon hasn’t been coming to the club at all lately.
Not that I care.
In fact, I’m glad he’s out of my life. I suspected the brief, tension-charged meeting in the bathroom wasn’t the end of Landon, but maybe I’m reading too much into it.
Maybe he’s finally done with me.
Good.
I don’t need the definition of toxic drama in my life.
And yet the beer tastes even more bitter and disgusting. Everything does.
I’m convinced it’s just a phase. It has to be.
“Why aren’t you dancing down there with your less pleasant clone, baby Sokolov?” Kill yells over the music and nudges my arm with his.
I lift my shoulder and don’t say anything.
Besides, one—or two—of us needs to keep an eye on Niko.
I steal a peek at my brother, who’s been chain-smoking for the past thirty minutes. One after the other, as if he’s on a mission to give his lungs cancer.
He’s been getting worse, not better, despite the coping methods Jeremy has been dishing his way. It seems that no amount of violence will drag my brother from his state of mental self-destruction.
I tap his hand and he looks at me, but like this morning when he hugged us and wished us a happy birthday, he’s not really seeing me.
After abandoning my can of beer on the coffee table, I sign, “Wanna dance?”
He shakes his head.
“For me?” I blink my eyes innocently.
He shakes his head again.
Kill throws a pillow at him. “It’s her birthday. Do it.”
“I’m going to fucking murder you, motherfucker.” Nikolai throws back the pillow, hitting Kill square in the face.
My cousin doesn’t do it again, because he might have provoked Nikolai’s trigger-happy fight response.
I grab my brother’s hand and pull, but since he’s a specimen of pure muscle, it’s impossible to move him.
Finally, he stubs out his half-finished cigarette in the overcrowded ashtray and lets me tug him to a standing position.
I hold on to his hands as I jump to the music. At first, he’s completely unaffected, but then Kill joins us and pushes Niko to make more of an effort.
The whole dancing thing happens due to them shoving each other and spinning me around.
For a moment, I get to unwind, laughing and giggling at how they’re so close to fighting while pretending to dance.
Then, all of a sudden, Kill comes to a halt.
The reason is none other than Jeremy walking in our direction, an arm wrapped around the small of his girlfriend Cecily’s back and accompanied by Glyn and Bran.
Glyn envelops me in a hug and pushes a bag into my hand. “It’s small gifts from the three of us. Happy Birthday.”
“Thank you. You didn’t have to,” I sign and look at Bran, who’s unusually stiff, then type on my phone, “I didn’t think you’d come.”
“You personally invited me. I wouldn’t miss it,” he says with a polite smile, keeping his eyes on me.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Nikolai pushes me behind him and gets nose to nose with Bran. “Another elaborate plan from your brother? What is it this time? Arson? Assault? Murder, maybe?”
I grab onto Nikolai’s arm, and when he doesn’t move, I stand beside him and sign, “Bran is my friend. I invited him to my birthday.”
“It’s okay, Mia,” Bran says to me, even though his eyes, disturbingly similar to Landon’s when he’s angry, remain on Niko. “I couldn’t care less about your brother’s opinion of me, but it’s probably better that I leave.”
“No.” I shake my head a few times.
“Mia is right,” Jeremy says. “You’re our guest.”
Killian, who just finished kissing Glyn—or more like eating her face in front of her brother—releases her and grabs Niko by the shoulder. “If you can accept Glyn and Cecily, you’ll have to accept Bran, too. He has nothing to do with Lan, despite the creepy physical resemblance.”
“He’s right,” Glyn says in a soft voice. “Bran is completely different from Lan. I promise.”
Nikolai continues glaring at Bran as if he wants to seep inside him and destroy whatever he finds in there.
This side of my brother is eerily frightening, and the worst part is that I don’t think I’ve ever seen it before.
I grab his hand and pull him back so that he looks at me. “It’s my birthday. I get to invite whomever I please. Don’t ruin it, please.”
He grunts and snatches his pack of cigarettes, but before any of us can release a breath, the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
Oh, no.
Please tell me I’m overthinking—
My hopeful thoughts come to an end when a very familiar, effortlessly taunting voice echoes in the air.
“What’s with the tense atmosphere? I thought this was a birthday. Also, did someone mention the word ‘ruin’?”
My eyes widen upon clashing with none other than Landon’s.
I was wrong.
He doesn’t look one bit done with me.
25
LANDON
Different day, same irreparable need to fuck up the world and watch it crash and burn.
A wave of hostility shoots in my direction, attempting—and failing—to penetrate my skin from every side. Glares and sneers bounce off my outer layer like rubber arrows.
None of them mean shit to me.
The only one I honor with my undivided attention is the girl in a hot black dress that hugs her curves in all the right places. A leather collar is wrapped around her delicate throat and my favorite blue ribbons snake through her pigtails.
Defiant, proud eyes the color of blue wildflowers stare at me. For a moment, during the fraction of a second when I made my spectacular theatrical entry, those eyes were stupefied, then those emotions morphed into being horrified, but now they’re pools of disapproval.
I can work with disapproval.