Correction. She went to Jaxon.
Fucking bitch.
Jaxon turned her down, which means he’s even more of a fucking idiot than I’d thought. But it does give me an argument as to why Dean’s victory is invalid. The rules say that the heir who takes the pet’s virginity, with her permission, is the next ruler of the town. The bloody sheet is displayed at the next ritual. If the pet gives in before then, the title is formally ceded, to be official after graduation.
But Athena didn’t choose Dean. She chose Jaxon. She only went to Dean because he rejected her. Which, in a roundabout sort of way, means that she didn’t choose Dean.
Dean, of course, is going to fight that to the bitter fucking end. But so will I.
Because I didn’t spend all of my teenage years being worked and beaten half to death, forcing protein shakes and mashed potatoes down my throat to satisfy my father’s twisted idea of what a man should look like—when he doesn’t even fucking look like that, the man has a fucking pot belly for god’s sake—for Dean fucking Blackmoor to win the town back for his fucking arrogant-ass family.
And I didn’t spend all these years dreaming about the day I’d get my revenge on Athena Saint for her to spend her nights in Dean’s bed, either.
Which is exactly where I’m guessing she is right now.
It’s fucking torture, thinking of her with him. Thinking about him taking the thing that I’ve obsessed about for so long. Even if I got to fuck her now, it wouldn’t be the same. I wouldn’t be the first. I wouldn’t get to ruin it for her, make her beg and cry, make her plead for me to go easy, only for me to rip her open on my fat cock for the first time. She’s used up pussy now.
That doesn’t mean I don’t still want her. I just need to think of some other way to make it satisfying for me. Some way that will fuel the revenge that I’ve been dreaming of for so long.
Since my brother died in that fucking accident, I’ve had to be the best at everything. Sometimes, in my darkest, angriest moments, I hate him for dying, even though I know he’d rather be in my place and alive. I wonder how he would have treated Athena, how he would have felt about all of this. He was always weirdly nice to girls, I remember. He had a long-term girlfriend since his freshman year. Would they have kept dating in college? How would she have handled him being required to fuck the house pet? Would he have gone along with it, or would he have fought back, like Jaxon? Argued about why things are the way they are?
No one is ever gonna fucking know the answers to that. All I know is that there are two places I’ve felt out of my brother’s shadow—on the rugby field and when I’ve been pursuing Athena. Because both of those are things, he would never have wanted to do. He played sports, but football, golf, tennis—palatable, nice sports. He was a gentleman to women, and I think he actually meant it. Not like my father, who makes a show of it, but deep down probably loved degrading my mother during their time in the house. Hell, maybe he still does.
Since Daniel died, all the pressure has been on me to keep the town from the Blackmoors. The Kings are a fucking joke; we never needed to worry about them. But Dean Blackmoor was always a real contender. And now he has the thing that might hand it to him on a silver platter.
Athena’s virginity.
If I’d stayed the second son, the extra, I could have done whatever the fuck I wanted, within reason. Played rugby for a national team, maybe. My father would have let me do it for a while, until he needed to reel me back in and install me at some stupid company. But even then, it would have been easy work. Not much responsibility. Just showing up at board meetings and saying a few words and then enjoying my money and all the pussy I would have been drowning in. I could have done whatever I wanted to whoever I wanted in bed.
Instead, I’m here, in this house, thinking about another guy’s dick in the girl that was supposed to be mine. And it’s making me fucking furious.
It’s making me want to take revenge on both of them. And that pisses me off, too.
Dean and Jaxon are the closest thing I’ve ever had to brothers.
I lost one brother already. And now there’s a wedge driven between the ones I have left and me. Not brothers by blood, but fucking close enough.
Which reminds me, all over again, why I can’t get too close to Athena. Why my desire for her, my need for her, has to be about revenge and possession, nothing else.
Because I can’t ever let something get so close that it hurts to lose it again.