Page 178 of Poison Aches

“Ivy—”

“I don’t care what you say! I’m not leaving.” I cry but I can see it on their faces, I’m not going to win this.

They’re going to have their way, as they always do.

So, I do the next best thing.

I turn around and run out the house, still holding the ceramic piece that’s now coated in hot, stark-red blood.

CHAPTER 24

Emmett

Ivy, 13; Emmett, 16

“I bet your dead mother punched better than you ever could.”

Eleven ill-informed, malicious words started this…

Words uttered by an asshole who fucked around and now, he’s about to find out.

In hindsight, I knew Vaughn was baiting me, scenting me out, wanting to go a few rounds with me.

He’d been raring to go since he and his father, one of my mother’s brothers, as well as the rest of the Family, came down to Westbrook Blues last night for a ‘sudden’ visit.

Of course, nothing is ever sudden.

I just turned sixteen a few days ago.

They obviously came down to check if the fucking heir is still upright and functioning since the rumors of my ‘illness’ or whatever it might be have been floating around.

To say Syrus has been working overtime to silence those rumors would be an understatement.

Part of me would like the truth to come out, but I know if that happens, I’ll never find my mother, so when he started pushing me to “act” normal, I did most of the work myself.

So now here I am, punishing a loudmouth for daring to talk about my mother while simultaneously burying the rumors that are actually true.

“Keep your fucking fists up, boy!” a voice snaps from the side of the ring, but I know the instruction is not for me. It never is for me.

No one stands in my corner to cheer me on or give me instructions like the fucker I’m beating the crap out of.

In fact, my corner is always silent and empty—just how I prefer it.

I’m expected to excel beyond the possible. Expected to know, to outperform, outmaneuver, and outsmart every single fucker that might come my way, family or not.

And I always deliver.

Not for them, but for what I plan to do.

I strain my body to keep upright and not topple over even though there’s a loud ringing between my ears unlike anything I’ve ever felt before.

My heart is working overtime and I know it’s about to give in, but I don’t dare allow it.

My jaw is bruised and hurts like crazy.

My knuckles are already split open and bleeding. After all, we’ve been at this for just half an hour minutes, but I won’t stop until he's within an inch of his life.

The same chant repeats in my head, for my fucking blotched heart.

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