Chapter 16: Little Liar: Chapter 16

Malachi’s arms are tight around my waist while I stare into the mirror and apply mascara to my lashes. The side of his face is pressed to my back while I sit between his parted legs. I keep thinking he’s fallen asleep, but then he tightens around me some more and groans with moodiness.

His fingers play with the waistband of the sleep shorts I threw on after the shower because apparently sitting in a towel makes him feral. I slap his hand away when he tries to slide it between my legs. He lifts his head to glare at me in the mirror from over my shoulder.

“Learn to be told no.”

He sighs and buries his head into my back again. “You don’t love me.”

Laughing, I try to move forward, but his hold gets tighter. I huff. “Can you let me go so I can get my hairbrush?”

He shakes his head, pulling me into his body more. “Stay.”

“You’re so clingy,” I reply with a laugh, checking the time on my phone. “Shit, I’m late. Mom’s already going to flip about me being off all last week. Do you want her to hunt us down and arrest you for kidnapping?”

The silence is deafening. He’s thinking about the possibility of her intruding on us, popping our little bubble of happiness. If she appeared, he would probably be arrested for murdering her. Even the thought makes me shiver because it’s not like he isn’t capable. Malachi may revolve his entire life around me, but he’s violent and unpredictable.

I think he’d kill someone for me. I mean, he nearly murdered our father because he caught us at the top of the stairs. What would he do to Mom?

Maybe I should set up a meeting for us to all sit down and talk. Get it over with—rip the Band-Aid off and accept the backlash that will definitely come our way. They already know we’re together, so what’s the worst that could happen? They don’t accept us? We’re adults now.

Besides, I could use their help right now.

They know him—they’ll have an idea of how to help with the way he is. They adopted him knowing about his troubles and his issues, even helped him get his diagnosis—they’ll be able to give me directions on how to help him not spiral and lose himself.

I always knew he struggled, but this last week since coming back to him… Sometimes he’s here but he’s not. It’s getting worse, and I don’t know what to do. I try to make sure he takes his meds, and he’s refused to go to his therapy appointments this week because being separated from me is the worst thing to possibly happen to him, so he dismisses everything else to be close to me.

It’s the main reason I want to go back to work—I need Malachi to focus on himself.

He’s going to fall off the cliff, and I’m not strong enough to catch him.

He’s going to hurt someone—I can feel it. Unless he already has. He has an alarming number of weapons in one of the spare rooms.

I think he’s hurt people since he was released. It explains why the people Mom has thrown me towards have gone silent.

Images of Malachi throwing our bloody father down the stairs after beating him to a pulp make me inwardly wince. That was a long time ago—he’s not like that anymore surely?

Well, if we forget the fact he abducted me, chained me up, then continued to pleasure me against my will while hiding his identity. I had a feeling it was him. I pretended in my mind that it was him. Maybe that makes me ridiculous, but I loved every moment.

He has every reason not to trust me based on the fact I let a stranger ruin my body without knowing completely that it was him the entire time. But my delusional self knew, deep down, that it was Malachi.

It excited me.

It also scared me because I was fully willing to let Malachi take his revenge on my body. I still have his initials burned into my skin. He kisses them when his mouth travels down over my breasts, on his way between my legs to fuck me with his tongue.

He won’t apologize for the burns. It’s his way of claiming me. A brand that tells everyone who I belong to.

And I belong to Malachi Vize.

I’m not sure how this will work. We have so many hurdles to get over. I want it to work though. I love my brother, and he loves me—that won’t ever change.

I blink, staring at myself in the mirror. I should stop calling him that too. We aren’t siblings anymore. We’re boyfriend and girlfriend. I know he likes it though, and a depraved part of me does too. Does that make us sick to crave such a taboo and forbidden connection?

When he’s inside me, and I call his name, he groans and fucks me faster, but when I call him my big brother? He grows within me, thicker, longer, pulsing against my sweet spot while we both find our release.

I’ll need to try and explain everything to Abigail and Anna. I’ve gone into an antisocial bubble ever since I ran from my wedding. Anna told me to keep her updated on everything. I sent Abbi a text saying I was fine, and she told me she was going to punch Xander’s big brother.

Apparently, after I ran from the church, his brother and Abbi argued—he told her he was going to kill her, and she slapped him and told him to go fuck himself.

I’m not sure what happened after. Her details are a little vague, and her story has changed three times. She’s also now chanting the tune of celibacy. She went on about it for nearly an hour—something about swearing off men forever and becoming increasingly violent with her words before Malachi grabbed the phone and hung up on her.

I try to turn and look at Malachi, but he’s too tangled around me. He’s always attached to me in some way. If I’m cooking us some food, he’s behind me. If I’m in the shower, he’s either in with me or sitting on the sink counter. If I’m trying to tidy up, he’s helping or forcing me to sit down so he can do it properly.

Ever since I told him I had to go back to work, he’s been clingier than ever, as if I’m not going to come back here. I am. I will. I just feel like we need to pump the brakes and slow down, but he’s in total refusal.

It hurts me, but I’m also happy. We could hide in this little home for years and I’d be happy, but there would always be the outside. The place that won’t accept us. Society. Parents. The fiancé who’ll hopefully give up and move on to the next person on his list.

“If our mom and dad came to see us, would you get all angry and aggressive?” Another beat of silence, and I sigh. “You need to accept them if you want them to accept us.”

“They hate me,” he says quietly, slowly, so carefully I know the words hurt him to admit. His pronunciation is still off, but I can understand most of what he’s saying. “Nothing I say will ch-change that.”

The corner of my mouth tugs because he has no idea Dad has been tracking him since he was released from prison, making sure he’s okay, ensuring Mom gave him enough money to survive until he figured out what to do with his life.

They’ve loved him from afar. Despite everything, they still raised Malachi since he was eight years old. They still took him under their roof, loved him, made everyone around them learn sign language, and ensured they had him placed in a school that could accommodate his needs.

Everything he ever needed, they gave him. They care about him.

Well, I’d like to think they still care. No one can go that long seeing someone as their child, only to throw them away so easily. Dad tried to visit, but Malachi refused. If I’m correct, Dad paid a prison guard to give him weekly updates on his son and made sure the therapist that visited him was one of the best around town. As a criminal defense attorney, or an ex one, he has a lot of influence given the clients he’s had in his career.

I guess it helps to know people in power. Mom being a judge definitely helps.

“Will you drive me to work before you go to your appointment?”

He nods against me. I glance over my shoulder, pressing a soft kiss to his lips when I see the look in his eyes.

Like he’s about to lose me.

I chance my luck once more by sucking in a deep breath and turning in his arms, hugging his hips with my thighs. I smile, tilting my head to the side as he narrows his gaze.

“Don’t,” he warns.

“Ask me on a date,” I say, ignoring him, pleading with my eyes. “Wine and dine me and treat me like a princess before dropping me off at my apartment. You can kiss me against the door until we’re breathless.”

His nostrils flare, his eyes darkening, and I shriek as he flips us over, placing me on my back. “No,” he says, smashing his lips down on mine, capturing my bottom lip between his teeth and nipping.

I gasp as he shoves his hand into the front of my shorts and cups my pussy with firm fingers, digging against my entrance with the barrier of my panties while my bottom lip is trapped between his teeth.

He releases it with a snap. “Stop asking.”