His tone makes uneasiness crawl across my skin and down my spine, despite the relative harmlessness of the statement. Though, even with his seemingly benign words, I doubt there's anything that could convince me that this man isn't as conniving as he seems.
"Isn't it?" Jackson drawls in response from across the island, no clear inflection present in his gravelly voice.
I turn my eyes to him instead, mostly just for a reason to take my focus away from his father and how uncomfortable his presence makes me.
Jackson's gaze is locked squarely on his father. His body stiff and still and unyielding.
"Willa," Sebastian says, dropping the subject and demanding my unwilling attention back to him and the pristine cut of his gray suit, the handsome face of a man much younger than him and his cold, calculating eyes. "I'm so sorry I couldn't be here for your birthday, your first one back. But I'm sure you all managed to find some fun, anyway."
His perfect smile stretches thin over his face, obviously pleased over whatever he's implying as he looks at me.
"Pretty boring night, actually," I retort. I know it wouldn't be hard for him to discover the party, if he isn't already aware of it, but there's no evidence of it right now and it's not in my nature to let someone I don't trust have whatever it is they're looking for. "But there's always next year."
When Blue bounds in a moment later, followed by Weston at his heels, I'm infinitely grateful for the interruption.
I don't even bother to greet my brother properly, I just shoot him a brief look of gratitude over my shoulder—which he returns with a nod of understanding—while I jump up to sort out food for Blue as he runs over and immediately tries to steal Zeus', nosing him out of the way.
"Good morning," Sebastian says lightly, presumably to Wes, though I don't turn around to check.
I crouch down next to Blue while he begins to devour his food, scratching his fluffy head softly as he does and stalling for time, mostly.
Weston skips the pleasantries, "When did he get home?" He asks evenly.
"Early this morning." Sebastian answers him, his voice losing some of its earlier charm.
This piques my interest, enough for me to open my mouth in an attempt to jump in and ask, my dad? But the words get lodged in my throat and I can't get them out. I'm stuck with only an intake of breath and frozen muscles.
Even after all these weeks, I've yet to call him that.
Dad.
I've heard my brother's call him that, and he's my father too, I know and accepted that weeks ago. But it's different to know that and to call him Dad. It's a personal and familiar word, too much so and enough that I can't even force the word out when I try.
So, I swallow the words down instead. Ignoring them. And I tell myself it's something I'll work on, later, and begin to brew a cup of coffee for my brother instead.
Jackson's father doesn't stay long after Wes' entrance, telling us he's going back to join our father in his office, thankfully.
I carry over the coffee I made for Weston—black with one sugar—and hand it to him as I retake my place at the island, Zeus close at my feet.
As the days leading up to the start of school pass, I fall back into the tenuous routine I've held over the weeks since getting here, though it's filled with a lot more attempts at house training and picking fur off of my clothes than it had before.
A huge part of me is ready to go back to school. Entering that stage of summer where I'm craving something new to break up my days again, but I think that part of me is recalling my old life and how it's always been before, the simplicity that came with it. But I'm not living that life anymore, and can't allow myself to fall back on the past normalcy that isn't here now.
Though, I can say it has been incredible not having to worry about saving every single dime I earn to live through through the coming school months like I was forced to before.
And still, spending the days with my brothers, and now Zeus and Blue will never become monotonous. Even when I'm itching for something else. More.
There's even a day when Wes and Wyatt are out with Jackson that our father sits and joins Wren and I for take out pasta we ordered for dinner.
And it's nice. Easy, actually, to spend time together like that. Even when he inevitably has to leave to take a call, kissing the top of my head and ruffling Wren's soft curls as he does.
I wake up the morning of the first day of school with an immediate and overwhelming sense of dread.
I'm only minutely soothed by the rhythmic and steady in and out of Weston's breathing as he sleeps soundly next to me.
Thankfully, the puppies responded well to the practice of settling down for the night so we were able to put them together and still get some sleep ourselves.
It may be a shortsighted and childish thing to be grateful for, and moreover to rely on this sort of comfort in the first place, but I can't deny its result and effectiveness.
I slide out of bed on the tips of my toes, though I know it can't be past 5:30, and quietly start on my typical morning procedure.
I think it's mostly to sedate my nerves, acting like this is or could be any other day.
I take Zeus and Blue out to the patch of fake grass, and then settle them both into bed quietly when they're done. However, Zeus has been showing some clingy tendencies and starts to whine a bit when I walk away to the bathroom.
It's not enough to wake Wes, though, and he continues to sleep while I try to chip away at the time by at least thirty minutes in the shower.
By the time I'm done, the soap suds have long been washed away by the hot water pounding into my muscles, and the control panel of the shower reads nearly ten minutes to 6:00.
After drying off as much as I can with a towel, I get dressed back into the shorts and tank top I slept in and slip into my room, taking care to be as silent as I can knowing Wes is still sleeping.
I gather up Zeus and Blue and take them with me when I leave the room, allowing the door to shut softly behind me.
I hold Blue against my chest but place Zeus on the floor of the hallway, knowing he'll want to walk at my feet, hearing the soft click of his little nails against the ground as he does.
I slow my steps as I near the kitchen, momentarily confused. The area is dark, silent and still. It takes me by surprise. It's completely empty of the atmosphere I'm used to feeling fill the space, and without a sign anyone's been in here at all this morning.
It's not until this moment that I realize just how reliant, or at least expectant, I've become of my encounters with Jackson each morning.
We never said much to each other, but it was a stable part of my routine every day since I've been here. No matter what I did during the day, and the various ways it would change, that part was always the same.
And standing there, in the dark and vacant room, I'm at a place where I can admit to feeling a bit lost because of it—but only to myself.
So, I focus on doing something else. There's still a while before anyone is up, so I might as well be productive in the meantime.
I pour food and fresh water into bowls for the puppies, nudging away Blue when he yet again tries to go for Zeus' food instead of his own, and start pulling out some simple ingredients from the fridge and freezer.
Wyatt is the one we usually count on to cook for us, but I'm not completely inept. I have a carton of eggs and a pack of bacon and I get to work.
I'm waiting for another set of toast to pop when Wyatt walks in.
"Morning," I murmur over my shoulder.
His partially wet hair is pulled back like it usually is, but he's also got on half of his uniform, which is somewhat of a shocking sight to see from him. The ultra white buttoned shirt over the dark gray pants is something more typical of what Wren would be seen wearing.
"Hey Wills, you made breakfast?" Wyatt asks, scooping Zeus up off the floor and cuddling him against his large chest in one arm, sidling up next to me as he does.
"Mhm," I confirm around a slice of bacon as he throws his free arm over my shoulder.
"You ready for today?" His tone turning more serious as he asks.
"Of course," I tell him, honestly enough. "It's gonna be good, right?"
Wren enters then, his ensemble almost identical to Wyatt's, though he has his shirt tucked in and the sleeves rolled up his forearms.
Wyatt passes Zeus to me and gently pushes me away as he takes over the finishing touches of breakfast.
"You're not getting credit for this." I admonish him.
He lets out a quick but loud laugh. "I'd never dream of it, Will."
I sit next to Wren at the island, with him immediately folding his arms, laying his head on them and closing his eyes.
I giggle despite myself, rubbing his back lightly as he groans.
"'Dunno how you do this every morning," He mumbles to me.
"If you woke up at the same time as me, you wouldn't be so tired this morning." I inform him.
"Shh," he tells me, "I'm sleeping."
Wyatt plates the food I prepared and is buttering the toast when Wes walks in. He's wearing his partial uniform exactly like Wren, and though it isn't his usual style it's not as much of a surprising difference to his normal look compared to Wyatt. Just more cleaned up and polished.
My twin smiles his small smile at me as nears me, kissing my forehead quickly before taking Jackson's seat across from me.
I don't ask, yet, but I almost do.
The four of us eat together and we discuss aspects of the coming day, some easier than others.
One of them being the pet care center I found to drop the puppies off at while we're at school, so they'll be safe and won't be lonely, and other things like my schedule though I've already memorized most of it after getting access to my account on the school's website.
But I nod along and absorb their words all the same to balm my anxiety until I can't avoid getting ready any longer.
After I worked up the nerve to check out the uniform a few days after it arrived, I took it out of the box and laid the items on the island in my closet and that's where they've stayed since. To be honest, I'm appreciative of all the choices they give you, and that I can have my pick from them.
I examine all the elements carefully, I can choose between pants similar to the ones Wes, Wren and Wyatt were wearing and a pleated skirt—thankfully not plaid but in the same dark charcoal gray color.
There's also both a long and short sleeved starch white button shirt, and three different navy pieces to wear over it, all including the carefully stitched school crest over the heart. There's the blazer, which I immediately dismiss. There's a soft, thin pullover that I consider but ultimately go with the cardigan.
There's some more bits and pieces, like a tie there's no way in hell anyone is going to get me to wear and different stockings as well as a few insanely long socks.
By the time I'm fully dressed, I'm in a pair of those black socks that end generously high above my knees, the charcoal skirt that I actually kind of like, the short sleeved bright white shirt tucked into it and the dark navy cardigan I wear undone over the top.
For shoes, I decide to take a risk—a risk for me, at least—and slip on some slightly heeled black ankle boots instead of the flats I planned on.
I leave my hair down, allowing it to hang long and flowing around me like a sort of shield.
The last thing to do is grab my backpack, one a lot classier than I've ever owned before, and hardly big enough to fit my supplies as well as the slim laptop Wes advised me to bring.
I meet him in the garage and see Weston wearing the navy pullover on top of his white shirt, and like me—no tie, which I can't help but smile at.
Wes and I leave the house in his pretty, black SUV while Wren and Wyatt each take their own cars. We load both of our backpacks and secure Zeus and Blue in their carriers in the back seat.
We're downtown when I can't hold in my question's any longer.
"Where was Jackson this morning?" I inquire, as mildly and uninterested as I can manage to sound.
Wes glances at me briefly, suspicion and accusation full to bursting in his expression, before turning his eyes back to the road.
"What's going on with you two?" He asks. I don't fail to realize he didn't answer my question.
"Nothing," I guarantee him truthfully, though maybe a bit too quickly going by the look he shoots me after I respond.
He's silent for a few more moments as we drive, and doesn't speak again until we're pulling up to the pet daycare company.
"I don't want you with him." He states plainly.
I feel a bit like I've stumbled onto a minefield, and one wrong step could mean a mess I don't want to deal with. But still, I can't help but try and pry more from that assertion.
"I thought he was your best friend?" I tread lightly as he parks the car and turns his full attention to me.
This close, I can see more of our likenesses. It's obvious in the white wave of his hair pushed back off his forehead and our eyes but there's also the subtleness in the way his brows furrow and his lips purse slightly just like mine
"Exactly." He counters quickly before turning off the engine and exiting the car.
We have to drive passed town and further until buildings are more scattered and separated by fields of grass before Wes tells me we're approaching the school.
If he hadn't told me that's what this place was, there's no way I would have guessed it was a school.
There's tons of cars, all similar to the styles filling our garage at home leading up the smooth pavement that makes up the road all the way to the massive brick structure.
It has to be three or four stories high and made almost entirely out of well kept, but still clearly original, red-brown bricks—and lined evenly all the way across the wide front of the building are tall, narrow windows. Enough so that every room must have a few of them.
I can see a sign on the immaculate lawn, proudly displaying the school's crest and name. Hillcrest Private Academy.
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Thank you guys so much for 2000 votes! I hope those of you still reading will continue to enjoy this story.
P.S. As always, publishing schedule will be written on my profile :)