𝐂𝐑𝐔𝐄𝐋 𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐄𝐑 - kiara carrera¹

𝒍𝒊𝒊. 𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒔𝒊𝒔𝒕𝒆𝒓

*16 Years Ago*

"One last push, Carla," the nurse encouraged sweetly. Though, it was hard to be so kind when this family was so terrible. If it weren't for the incredibly violent threat she received at the beginning of the night, she would've called DCS on them. The father was a powerful man the whole town feared, and while his girlfriend was in labour with triplets, all he was doing was smoking weed and egging on his older two sons, who were still only infants themselves, to stab each other with the very real knifes he had bought them for Christmas.

"Whoever reaches an organ first is free from a head-uh tonight," he said.

The nurse wasn't too sure what a 'head-uh' was, but by the looks on the young boys' faces, it couldn't have been very good.

Two out of three triplets had already came out - two girls; one, sobbing and screeching for the attention her distracted father wasn't giving her; and the other sleeping peacefully after verociously tearing up half of her mother's stomach.

Although she wasn't nearly as bad as the father, the mother wasn't the greatest either. The other two boys weren't hers, and she openly admitted that if she knew she were having three from the start, she would've aborted them. Which was fine, obviously, but when the first girl came out, she said that was the only one she wanted. And when the next girl came, she simply scowled and tossed her aside in disgust. She didn't want to raise a Quinn - 'their blood is poison' was her exact words. She was convinced that these three children were going to be nightmares, and she was already secretly planning her escape with only one child. The nurse wasn't quite sure how the woman was going to escape Nathan Quinn, though - nobody had ever done that before. That was why all of his exes were dead. But Carla Limbrey was clearly raised on wealth and upper-class, and had stupidly gave it all up for the Quinns. Maybe she would find her way back to her real family - the nurse truly hoped she would - but Nathan Quinn wasn't known for letting them get away.

"Here he is," the nurse said joyfully, holding up the very last baby - a boy. He didn't cause as much destruction as the sister before, but the way he was thrashing, you could tell he certainly was a Quinn.

"Put him down," the mother ordered. "Give me the first one."

"But don't you want to -"

"The first one."

And so it happened. The triplets were born. But still, Thomas and Tatum were always twins. Just the two of them - blocked out by the family they didn't fit in with, but would do anything for them to love them. The male baby slowly wrapped his small hand around his sister, swearing to protect her forever.

𑁍𑁍𑁍

*15 Years Ago*

"Happy birthday, my baby girl," Carla Limbrey cooed, bouncing Tilly on her knee as she gave her a stuffed animal.

From the couch, Nathan rolled his eyes and let out a scoff, snatching the thing off the baby and handing her a small pocket knife. He shook the kid on the arm. "No kid of mine's gonna be a pussy, ain't that right, Tills?"

Leroy and Joseph were carelessly shooting guns on the front lawn, arguing over who could kill more birds. They didn't care if anybody caught them - they were Quinns; they could do whatever they wanted and not give a shit about the consequences. Even as lousy infants, people feared them for their name.