And, I'll drink till all my blood is filled with you
Till the whiskey drowns my sorrow,
and I'm not thinking about tomorrow
whatever it takes to feel you again, to feel you again
— 1000 Years by Liza Anne
As soon as Isaac introduced himself, Summer bolted to the kitchen while screaming at me not to come after her. We could hear everything from the living room. She was coughing, vomiting, and cursing at us to drop dead.
"Did you know that Nick and Jordan broke up a few days ago?" said Isaac, breaking the silence between us. "Heard it was bad."
My eyebrows furrowed. "Weren't they planning to move in together?"
"Apparently, Jordan's been acting weird these past few weeks. He's been snappy and in a perpetual bad mood. They ended things the next day after the incident at the resort."
"Who ended things after what incident?" Summer asked, walking into the living room with the plate of waffles I prepared for her. She placed it down on the coffee table and squatted on the floor by my legs.
"Jordan and Nick," Isaac answered.
"Oh yeah, Nick told me all about it," she said before stuffing her mouth with the food. "Jordan's stressed out with his family's current financial situation."
I shook my head, slightly bemused. "Are we seriously having a normal conversation right now?"
Summer shrugged. "I'm starving. I need food to think."
"Me too, actually," Isaac chimed, reaching for Summer's plate.
She swatted his hand away and sneered at him. "Get your own food. I'm still mad at you."
I nodded in the direction of the kitchen, and Isaac was out of the couch in a snap. The clinking of silverware against the plate filled the silence, and I tilted my head slightly to one side, watching Summer's face brighten as she shoved a waffle into her mouth.
"You're not eating?" she asked.
"Not hungry."
"You should have something, Gray."
"I'm fine, Shortcake."
She turned to me with a glare. "We were supposed to have a nice breakfast together, and we could've already been fucking in your kitchen if it weren't for my itchy hands that discovered your secret drawer."
The corners of my mouth lifted into a smile at her choice of words, and I nodded. She stabbed a slice of the waffle with her fork, and I opened my mouth to let her feed me.
She scoffed. "See, that wasn't so difficult."
"You discovered his secret stash of weapons?" Isaac asked, sitting on the floor across from Summer. "Or the secret stash of dildos?"
"Dildos?" Summer glanced up at me with wide eyes.
I frowned. "I don't incorporate dildos in my regular jerk-off routine."
"I won't judge if you do," Isaac teased.
"I'll still love you," Summer added, laughing.
"I hope you both choke on your food."
"I'm sure Summer prefers choking on something else," Isaac snorted teasingly.
Summer pointed her fork at him. "Choke on what exactly, huh?"
Isaac shrugged and proceeded to eat his food. Summer grumbled a string of profanities, then quietly returned to finishing her breakfast. She fed me too, playfully making train noises as she brought the fork to my mouth. It surprised me that she was in a good mood, even after learning such heavy details about her mother.
"How many brothers do you have?" Summer asked Isaac.
"Four."
"Names?"
"Alexander, Dante, Ezekiel, and Lawrence."
"How does it work?" she asked inquisitively, finishing the last piece of waffle on her plate. "Like, who takes over the whole family thing?"
"My parents had already planned all that shit out when we were younger to prevent any internal arguments. Alexander is the eldest, so he's the successor."
"And you?"
He shrugged. "I usually work with Gray."
"He's easy to boss around," I deadpanned.
Isaac waved a hand dismissively.
Summer placed her cutlery down and moved to sit on the couch beside me, folding her legs together.
"So our parents used to be best friends?" she confirmed.
"They were like a three-headed dragon," said Isaac. "If you cut one head off, the other two won't survive."
I snickered. "You could've come up with something better."
"That was the fastest thing I could think of."
"What shit have you been watching these days?"
"Game of Thrones. Did you know that—"
"Oh my god!" Summer exclaimed. "I'm trying to think. Shut up."
Isaac threw his hands up in surrender as I leaned back on the couch. Summer tapped on her knees as she stared far into space, her eyebrows pulled together in thought.
"Now I know why I was forced to learn how to speak Italian," she mused, shaking her head lightly.
"That's your main concern?" Isaac gaped in disbelief.
"No, but I hated it," she brushed him off, then asked, "How does being royalty help hide who you truly are?"
Isaac smirked mockingly. "The royals wouldn't want the public to know that they're being protected and funded by a bunch of organized criminals. It was the perfect deal; the benefits go both ways."
"And my mom? She was your family's Consigliere?"
"Well, she wasn't that brutal," he defended quickly with a shrug, and my eyebrow popped. "I mean, she had to end the lives of a few people. Blow up some buildings. Infiltrate some gangs. Assassinate some pretty well-known dudes that were massive assholes. But it wasn't all so brutal."
Summer leaned into me with a frown. "There's something wrong with Isaac," she muttered.
I laughed and ruffled her hair before turning to Isaac. "We deeply appreciate your efforts to keep things positive, but it's pointless," I said.
He grumbled and rolled his eyes.
"So, what now?" asked Summer. "Gerald wanted to tell me this himself, and you're both going against his wishes. Neither of you would be doing this if you didn't need something in return."
She hit the nail on the head with that one.
I glanced over at Isaac and nodded once in approval. There was no going back after today. He stood from the couch and walked out of the house while I twisted my body halfway to face Summer. Her eyes were slightly wide in confusion as she peeked over her shoulder at Isaac before looking at me. I combed my fingers through her hair, then brushed my thumb across her bottom lip.
"The person who drugged you was hired by a person hiding behind the alias Marchioness," I said, watching as the confusion deepened in her eyes. "I found out recently that she could be responsible for Aila's condition."
"How?"
"Tortured," Isaac supplied as he hurried back into the living room. He slumped down on the couch across from us, then set his laptop on the table.
I turned back to Summer. "Mr. Preston said she was gone the entire summer before the scandal happened. He had no clue about her whereabouts, but according to him, she continuously sent messages saying that she was doing alright. When she returned home, she seemed off. Then everything blew up."
"Aila might've been kidnapped that summer and tortured," she said slowly, her head tilting slightly to one side. "Was that person after your family?"
"That's the theory."
"Then Aila was a mere puppet to execute the scandal," she noted, her eyes widening. "What did you say the name was?"
"Marchioness."
She turned to Isaac and pointed at his laptop. "Can I borrow that for a moment?"
"Uh, sure," he said, turning it around for her.
She leaned forward and began typing on the search bar in Google. My eyebrows pulled together in curiosity as we waited for the screen to finish loading, then she pointed at it with deep urgency swimming in her eyes.
Isaac transferred to the couch we were seated on.
"Marchioness of Spain?" he read, blinking slowly in bewilderment. "Why are we searching dead people?"
"Adelina Suarez," I said, eyeing Summer. She was staring at me expectantly. "She married into royalty as a ploy to murder her husband's family. She succeeded, and when she was questioned, she said her husband's father killed her family and raped her when she was only a child."
"The murder took place a year after the marriage. In every event she attended, she wore a personalized masquerade mask," Summer pointed out, her hands whirling in the air with gesticulations. "That was her signature look. She was known for that mask, and she wore it when she committed the murders."
"What does this have to do with our Marchioness situation?" Isaac questioned, his eyes darting back and forth between Summer and me.
I frowned as I discerned what she was trying to tell us. "You bumped into someone that night at the resort, didn't you?" I insinuated, my eyes boring into hers.
Summer nodded timidly. "The first time I saw her was when we were at the bar. She was standing by the corner, wearing the same replica of the mask Adelina had. Then I saw her again that evening."
"Did she approach you the second time around?" I questioned, and she nodded again. "Did she say anything?"
"She knew about the yearbooks."
Shit.
I rubbed my face and gritted my teeth in frustration.
"Your mother left a thumb drive that contains information about the Marchioness, and we believe that her identity is included in it," Isaac prompted, treading carefully on the subject.
"I don't recall seeing any thumb drive in her study at home," Summer mused.
"She left it with Gerald. He won't give the drive to anyone else but you. It's only you who can access it."
"Is it a biometric thing?"
"Your mother left something that none of them can decipher," I amended quietly, taking her hand in mine.
"What something did my mother possibly leave that none of you people can decipher?" she snorted in disbelief. Her body had tensed up at the information, and her leg bounced nervously.
"A password," I answered, grazing my thumb across her cheek. She let out a breath as her shoulders slumped. "But she didn't just put a password. She attached it to a system that would delete everything inside once a wrong input is made, or once it detects that it's being hacked into."
"I'm just finding out about these things, and it's all so overwhelming. How could I possibly know what the password is?" she stressed, frowning deeply at the thought.
Isaac cleared his throat. "First, we'll need to get the thumb drive."
"We are not sneaking into my father's office," I snarled, throwing him a pointed glare. It was a fucking death sentence to attempt such a thing.
"I wouldn't want to risk getting the worst beating of a lifetime, Gray," he barked back, rolling his eyes. "I was thinking of letting them meet."
"Meet Gerald?" Summer gasped in panic. "Today?"
"In two weeks," I clarified, forcing out a smile. "He'll be back from London then."
● ● ●
Summer was sitting on the bench by the lake at the back of my house, wrapped in a quilt. Today must've been stressful for her, though she was great at hiding it. Isaac stayed for a few hours before leaving, and after he left, she laid her head on my lap and said she wanted to take a nap. But she didn't. She was perfectly still for a good fifteen minutes while I caressed her hair. Then she started asking questions about our families.
Dropping the teaspoon on the sink, I grabbed the mugs of hot chocolate and followed her to the back of the house.
"Here," I said, handing her the drink.
She smiled up at me, accepting it. "Thank you."
I settled on the space beside her and wrapped an arm over her shoulders. Sighing, she scooted closer and leaned her head on me. The sun was beginning to set, casting shadows into the trees ahead. This was my sanctuary, a house I had built from the ground up a few years ago. It was in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by a large lake. The land was a gift from my grandmother.
"What did you mean when you said that love is just a shout into the void?" Summer asked quietly.
I glanced down at her and quoted John Green, "Oblivion is inevitable."
"Is that why you don't believe in love?"
"When did I say that?"
"Didn't yo—Sorry, I just assumed."
A smile reached my lips. "I'm in love with you, and I'm not in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things. I'm in love with you, and I know that love is just a shout into the void, and that oblivion is inevitable, and that we're all doomed and that there will come a day when all our labor has been returned to dust, and I know the sun will swallow the only earth we'll ever have, and I am in love with you."
She gawked at me, her eyes wide in disbelief.
"Most books, whatever genre it is, will always have some sort of love in them." I pinched her nose, and she pouted. "Love is something that people search for, and it can be in any form. In this fucked up world, loving someone or something makes the day seem better."
I kissed her neck lightly, my arms holding her in a loose embrace.
"I do believe in love, Shortcake. But I also believe that it won't last forever. When we die, the ones who loved us will remember us. But we have to remember that they're not immortal. Once they die, their memories of us go with them. Most of us don't see how lucky we are. At the end of the day, would you rather be remembered fondly by your loved ones or the faceless strangers who meant absolutely nothing to you?"
She gazed at me with a half-smile. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but you're right."
"When am I not?" I winked playfully, pulling away and taking a sip of my drink.
"A lot of times. But who's counting?"
I laughed and pinched her cheek. "Tell me what's on your mind."
She set her drink down beside her and climbed onto my lap. Startled, I wrapped an arm around her waist, then placed my drink down. She ran her fingers through my hair and massaged my scalp. I let out a groan.
"Promise me something, Gray," she said.
I eyed her skeptically. "That'll depend on what it is."
"Fair enough."
"What is it?"
"Don't push me away again," she said, eyes staring directly into mine. "Don't decide what's good for me and what's not. If you think there's a better option, then talk to me. You know more about this world, and it scares you. I barely know anything about this world, and it scares me. But we have each other. If push comes to shove, we'll find a solution. I haven't decided yet if I want to get involved in that part of your life or not. I mean, you technically gave me until the end of the year. But promise me, you'll stand by my decision. Regardless of what it is."
I let out a sigh. "I promise."
"That was easy," she said doubtfully, eyes squinting.
"Promise me something in return."
She rolled her eyes. "Should've seen that coming."
"Promise me that whatever you decide on will be what you want to do." I pushed her hair behind her shoulder and placed a kiss on her collarbone. "Don't think about what your mother would've wanted. Don't think about what your family wants. Don't think about the Inner Circle. Don't think about what I want."
"Okay," she decided. "I promise."
"Good."
I pressed my mouth to hers, sealing the agreement.
I could only hope that she would choose to take over HJ Corporation instead of following in her mother's footsteps as a Consigliere.