Page 67 of Beautiful Obsessions
I did want something.I just understood something he didn’t.
In our world—wanting was weakness.And weakness was something our father had spent years beating out of us.
So I buried it.And became exactly what he needed me to be.
Precise.Disciplined.Unbreakable.
The perfect heir to something built on blood and violence.Even then—even standing there with frost biting into my skin and my brother’s laughter still echoing in the air—I knew one thing with absolute certainty.
I would either inherit everything.
Or I would burn it to the ground before it ever had the chance to own me.
20
Tone
I’d crossed a line.
Not in the careless way most people did without thinking—like it was something you could step over and forget, like it didn’t matter once you’d moved on.No.This one was drawn in big bold marker.It sat under my skin, sharp and unrelenting, pressing in behind my ribs like something lodged there on purpose.
I leaned back against the kitchen counter, staring into the slow drip of coffee like it held answers.Like if I focused hard enough, I could rewrite the last twenty-four hours and take back the way I’d snapped at him.
Because I had.And Archie hadn’t deserved a second of it.
The anger I carried toward Atlas—the frustration, the resentment, the quiet humiliation of being shut out, talked over, dismissed like I couldn’t handle the same darkness they all thrived in—it was real.It had teeth.It had weight.
But Archie?
He’d just been doing what they asked.Standing where they told him to stand.Bleeding where they told him to bleed.And lately, he’d been doing more than that—fighting beside them, saving them, stepping into the kind of danger most men would run from.
All for people who weren’t even his.
I dragged a hand through my hair, exhaling slowly.
Since the moment I’d met him, he hadn’t once chosen himself.Not once.It was almost unnatural.
And I’d repaid that by turning on him like he was the source of everything I couldn’t control.
“Brilliant,” I muttered.“Really outdid yourself this time, Antonella.”
The machine hissed softly, finishing its cycle.I grabbed the mug before it cooled, turning—to find Archie standing there.
I hadn’t heard him come in, but that didn’t mean anything.Archie had a way of existing in a room like he belonged there whether you were ready for him or not.
His eyes found me instantly.Paused.Took me in like he was asking a silent question.
“You planning on poisoning that?”he asked, voice almost bored.
I rolled my eyes and shoved the mug toward him across the counter.
“There are better ways to get rid of you, Popovich.”
He raised a curious eyebrow but didn’t touch the mug straight away.His gaze flicked between the cup and my face, suspicion etched into the lines of him like it had always lived there.
“Should I be concerned you’re back to your usual charming self?”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” I shot back.“It’s the least I could do after the night we’ve had.”
