I collapsed onto the bed and grabbed a pillow, shoving my face underneath it. I let out a loud, long scream.
That made me feel a little bit better.
I crawled out from under the pillow and stared blankly at the ceiling. Slowly, my disgust and shock was replaced with anger.
Camille did a lot of dumb shit. She brought around her boyfriends, she got too drunk at parties, she said horrible things to the media, and she even had a sex tape somewhere that I totally refused to ever watch.
But she had never directly endangered me. She had never done anything that could lead to anything that could actually harm me.
She went too far this time. She had fucked up so much in the past, but this was completely different.
There was a knock at my door, and I really didn’t want to answer. But I knew I had to speak my mind or else never say it at all.
I pulled the door open.
“Honey,” Mom said, “that wasn’t what you think it was.”
“Get in here.”
She walked in and I slammed the door behind her.
“You have to understand,” she said. “I’m so lonely here. I have no friends, and Franklin was so nice to me.”
“Shut up,” I said fiercely to her, surprised by my own anger. “Just shut up, okay?”
She nodded slowly.
“Do you even understand who these people are?” I asked her.
“Of course I do.”
“Then you understand what they’re capable of.”
“Oh please,” she said, laughing. “Artie will never find out.”
“Stop rationalizing,” I said, shaking my head. “This is serious, Mom. If Arturo ever finds out, we could be dead, or worse.”
“You’re overreacting,” she said.
“No, I’m not. You’re fucking everything up for us again by acting like the completely messed-up wreck you really are.”
She stared at me, shocked. I had never said anything like that before.
I felt bad. I really did. I had tried as hard as I could to never say things like that to her, to try to support her, even when she was embarrassing and insane.
But enough was enough. She was fucking up. She was fucking up everything, and not just for herself.
“We have a good thing here,” I said softly. “We could actually like it here. You could be happy.”
“You don’t know anything, you silly girl,” she said viciously.
I shook my head sadly. “Stop ruining your life. Grow up. Be good to Arturo. Try to find happiness.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” She was on the verge of tears. “Arturo can’t satisfy me. Sexually, I mean.”
“Okay, gross. Enough,” I said quickly. “Enough. Just stop.”
“Honey,” she said, coming toward me.
I held up a hand. “Just leave me alone, okay, Mom? We can pretend like this never happened. I’m sure that’s what you want.”
She looked at me for a long time. Then silently, she turned and left my room.
I watched her go. I felt devastated and exhausted. I had never come down on my mother before, but I was beginning to truly see her as the immature and messed-up person she was.
I walked over to my bed and climbed in, trying to will away the memories of Franklin’s face between her legs.
I wanted to be normal. I wanted to be a family.
But then again, normal people didn’t marry their stepbrother.
I groaned to myself, sighing into the pillow.
Chapter Twenty-Four: Lucas
I moved slowly through the halls of the compound, thinking to myself. It felt good to pace the mainly empty space, trying to get a handle on the situation.
Things were beginning to move fast, and yet we didn’t have all the information we needed. I felt like I was trying to fight a guy with my hands tied behind my back.
I was stressed out, but some weird part of me thrived on the stress. I liked having a challenge, a puzzle to solve, and the higher the stakes, the more I wanted to step up. My head spun from all the different layers to my situation. There was Natalie, the hijacked shipment, the other bosses on my back, and of course my father.
As I walked, I suddenly found myself standing outside Natalie’s room. I checked my watch; it was late, probably too late, but part of me didn’t care. I could suddenly taste her skin on my tongue again, her body against mine, the tight squeeze of her pussy wrapped around my cock. I wanted to hear her say my name.
I knocked once and waited. I heard some muffled sounds, and then the door pushed open.
“Lucas?” Natalie asked.
“Can I come in?”
“Sure.”
She stepped aside and I walked in, sitting down on her couch. She looked like she had been sleeping, her hair a bit askew, her sweatpants wrinkled, but I absolutely fucking loved it. The girl could be wearing absolutely anything, look like she hadn’t slept for weeks, or be covered in mud and I’d still want her. It was absolutely uncanny how she affected me.