Page 148 of Delirium
“You know where to go?” Creed asked, taking a step backward.
“Show me,” I murmured, letting him lead the way through the foyer where we first gathered when we came over for Christmas. We passed next to the living room, going to the far end of the house, where the tall, metal door stood, leading to the basement, and the nerves I had tried to squash earlier reappeared.
Not because I was about to kill the bitch, but because I knew Kieran would be down there, like a fucking guard dog.
“Maya,” Creed murmured as he opened the door. “He’s down there, and he isn’t allowing anyone anywhere near her. He knows what’s coming for her, but I don’t know if he’s going to take it well that you’re the one coming.”
“I don’t give a fuck if he takes it well or not, Creed,” I grunted, looking at the illuminated staircase that would lead me to my target. “She made her bed and now she’s going to fucking sleep in it—forever. She took everything away from me, and now I’m going to put her out of her misery.”
“I’m just saying. He’s been a mess since he dropped her off. He wouldn’t talk to any of us, wouldn’t move away, barking at all of us to leave them alone. I have never seen that man looking so distraught.”
Cry me a fucking river. He knew she was about to die. He had to have known, but he was smart enough to at least bring her here.
“Where’s Tristan?” Creed asked as I took the first step toward the staircase.
“In the front.” I grinned. “Chained to the post.”
The quiet chuckle that bubbled over his lips surprised me, and I joined him, softly laughing along with him.
“I’ll take care of him.”
“Thank you,” I mumbled. Before he could utter another word, I pushed my legs down the stairs, slowly descending, as shadows played on the wall. Within mere seconds, I had my eyes plastered on Kieran’s back as he stared at his sister, chained inside the cell.
“I said to leave us alone,” he barked, still looking at her. Her eyes widened when she saw me, quickly replaced by a scowl, but she didn’t say a word.
“I don’t give a fuck what you did or didn’t do, Kieran,” I bit back, reaching the ground, and slowly walking toward him.
His head swiveled toward me, his bloodshot eyes taking me in from head to toe, landing on the knife strapped to my thigh. We both knew why I was here—it was inevitable.
“Maya,” he breathed out. All the emotions contained in those four letters as he uttered my name wouldn’t sway me. Not by him, not by the emotions he wasn’t even trying to hide anymore.
The first time I saw him down in Mexico, I thought he was sent to kill me, but I was wrong. I hated the way his eyes perused me, seeing more than I wanted him to see.
I hated that my blood boiled, humming at his nearness, because I didn’t have time for this, I didn’t fucking want this, especially not with him. I told myself it was the fact that I hadn’t been with anyone in a very long time, but deep down I knew, I was lying to myself.
I cared for this motherfucker. Unbeknownst to me, I cared for him, and I hated myself for caring, because he was already one of many who broke me before. But no matter how much I tried, no matter how much I wanted to hate him, I couldn’t, because every time I closed my eyes, every time I tried to erase him from my memories, I remembered the lost look on his face as he moved above me, begging me to forgive him, calling me by my sister’s name.
I still could see the shattered glass on the floor in that living room, and the defeat on his face. I still tasted the terror dripping from his lips, the heartbreak happening right in front of my eyes, and I used him as much as he used me.
I pretended I was someone he needed me to be because I knew he would never look at me the same way he looked at Ophelia. I knew that the love I felt for the boy I grew up with, the boy who would never be mine, would always have to be my little secret.
I forgot what it felt like, loving him in secret, while he conquered the world with my sister by his side. The moment he took me back here, it all came rushing back, like an avalanche of fucking emotions and I wasn’t able to stop it. I wasn’t able to do anything because he was still my Kieran.
He was still the boy who spoke to me of stars, the boy whose eyes made me feel dizzy.
But right now, he was the man standing between me and the woman who needed to die, and I couldn’t care less if she was his sister.
“Move, Kieran,” I said flatly, stepping closer to him. “You already know why I’m here.”
“No.” He stubbornly shook his head. “I can’t let you do this, Maya.”
“I’m not fucking asking you.”
“And I’m not fucking letting you!” he thundered, the hair at the nape of my neck rising at the pure anguish taking over his face. “She’s my sister.”
“And she tried to kill my sister,” I bit out. “She tried to take her kids away from her.”
“Maya, please—”
