The Revenge by Tijan

“What’s that mean for me and Matt?”

Kash’s eyes swung to Cyclone, then back to Seraphina. “I have a brother. A twin, actually.”

Seraphina’s mouth fell open.

“You do?”

“Madre de Dios.” That was Marie.

Chrissy coughed, clearing her voice. “Kash’s brother is the one who rescued me from the men that had taken me. He, uh, he helped me remember things.” She looked at me again, her eyes piercing. “He showed me a video of you.”

My heart skipped a beat. I’d been holding on to Kash’s arm in front of me, but now my fingers sank tight into him. “What videos?”

“You at my funeral.”

Another skip.

“You at some ceremony at your school. You had a dress on that I knew you hated wearing.” She smiled, but her eyes were so sad.

Skip.

“You at a bar with a couple of people.”

I was clinging to Kash’s arm, and my knees were starting to knock against each other.

“At your school. In your library. At other times you were with Kash, with your guards. There were more pictures. With Matt. None here. I don’t think he could get close enough for a long-distance lens.” Her head folded down.

That’s when I saw she was clinging to Peter’s other hand in her lap.

“I saw in the pictures as you were coming back to life. I was glad, Bailey. I was thankful.” Unshed tears lined the bottom of her eyelids. She swallowed. “You didn’t let him win. I was proud of you. Damn proud.”

I couldn’t stand.

My knees gave away.

Kash caught me, an arm sliding around my waist, and no one could see, but he was holding me up.

“Those videos and those pictures helped me, too. He didn’t win with me, either.”

But it was costing her to say these words.

For a moment, no one said a word.

“So you’re saying there’s two of you?” Cyclone was back on the Chase thing. He had scooted further up on Payton’s lap so he was standing, and more leaning back against where she was sitting. “Are you him right now? Are you guys that identical?”

Kash chuckled.

The tension broke in the room.

A few laughed.

“No, I’m not him.” He squeezed me, rocking me gently from side to side. “Bailey would know. She did know.”

“Hold up again.” Seraphina had a hand in the air, and she was standing in front of the couch. “You’ve met him?”

Her question was directed toward me.

I nodded. “I did.” I did not tell her the circumstances.

“Wha—Huh?” She gaped again, rotating to Cyclone and back to me, and then to Peter. “Not fair! We don’t know anything that’s going on. Chrissy’s dead, then she’s alive. Payton is actually Cyclone’s mother. Kash has a twin brother. What about me? Do I have a secret mother, too?”

Oh.

Oh, no.

The hope in that last sentence broke me.

I started to pull away from Kash, but he held me back. “They need to do this. Not us,” he murmured in my ear.

Peter edged from his couch, and he knelt in front of Sera- phina. He took her hands in his. “Quinn is your mother, Ser,” he whispered, though all of us could hear.

“But…” Her head folded even farther down, her chin resting against her chest.

Peter scooted all the way up to her, taking her gently into his arms. She went with him, her hands still in fists as her arms wrapped around his neck. “What’s wrong with me? Why is it always me?”

I strained to get free.

Kash kept me back.

I knew he was right, but I just wanted to grab my sister, hold her, say anything I needed to say to take away what she was feeling, and I had no idea what she was feeling. I just knew she was hurting, and it was a hurt that could change a person.

“Honey.” Peter eased back, smoothing the hair down the sides of Seraphina’s face. He framed her face in his hands. “Nothing is wrong with you. Nothing. You know why your mother was how she was with you?”

“Why?” A hiccup-sob.

“Because you were what Quinn knew she needed to be. You’re kind. You’re loving. You got all the goodness from her and from me. They mixed together and made you.”

“Dad.” But she grinned.

He grinned, too. “It’s true.”

“You didn’t get a crazy brain, Ser. We might be smart, but sometimes it sucks. Do you realize how hard it is to shut down this thing?” Cyclone pointed to his own brain, looking and sounding frustrated.

It worked. Seraphina’s grin got a little bigger. “I’m not smart like you guys.” She looked to Cyclone, me, and finally back to Peter.

“Honey. Sweetheart.” Chrissy leaned forward, touching Seraphina’s arm. “Take it from someone who lived with one of those ‘crazy smart’ brains, you have something they don’t have.” Chrissy’s gaze swept up, spotting me before she looked back to my sister. “I’ve seen what you can do. You have a genius that you’ve not even shared with the world. Do they know?”

Seraphina’s face got red, and real quick. “No.” Her head ducked down again.

Peter cast a questioning look at Chrissy, who made a show of pressing her lips closed.