Soft || 18+ Reverse Harem ||

42 - Chains

. . .

Andros Kozlov

There weren't many advantages of having parents who were feared by everyone who knew them. Except one - it taught me how to be ruthless. I knew what buttons to push, what words to say, and how to look.

In the starting years of my life, I had truly believed our parents were doing the best for us.

But then the Monets' came along. They didn't really talk to us at first, but we were eager to talk. Hedeon especially. He would ask them questions about the world and their family.

They indulged him. There were not many things to do back then. They told him about their father, how he wasn't cruel to them. They told him about their mother, and how she freaked out if they hurt themselves. Hedeon told me all of it with wonder in his eyes.

And then we wanted that. We wanted a family that would care in the way Monets' parents cared for them.

We did get that. They rescued us and adopted us. But, no matter how much they tried, I never felt like I was supposed to be with them. I was like a guest, sitting on the edge of the seat, looking at the clock, expecting to be asked to leave any minute.

"Andros."

I looked up from the knife I had been polishing. Hedeon was standing at the door, the chains in his hands. "Are you sure about this?"

I looked at the thick chains in his hands. They would be able to keep me down if I sleepwalked. There was no way in hell I'd be able to get out of them.

I didn't sleep much since what happened. And that was starting to weigh me down. I don't want to hurt Dahlia. This was a good way to make sure I wouldn't be able to.

"Yes," I said to him. "I'm sure."

. . .

Dahlia

I knocked on Andros' door, sipping the tiny amount of coffee that tyrant Lucian let me have every day. I wished I had never told them about the coffee thing. "Andros?"

I was here to rant to Andros. He was a bit more lenient.

"Dahlia." His voice was monotonous. I frowned. Why did he sound like that? The last time he had sounded like that was when...

Oh.

I opened the door.

He was sitting up, his arms pinned to his naked torso with huge, chunky chairs. His head was bowed, and strands of his hair fell over his forehead. I set my coffee down somewhere. My whole attention was on the man in front of me. His tattoos glinted in the soft golden light of his room.

He looked like a fallen angel. His wings were cut off.

"Andros?"

His head snapped up. Eyes blank and so, so beautiful. The green of them threatened to drown me. "Dahlia."

I approached him. He was sleepwalking. Well, not really walking. I think he would have been if his legs weren't chained to the bed, too. Right now, he was sitting on his knees.

"Hey." I was wary, but definitely not as much as I should have been. Hedeon and Andros had told me Andros was dangerous when he was sleepwalking.

But...he was Andros. I didn't know how to feel threatened by him.

I set my hand against his face. He blinked up at me, his face set in stone. My eyes fell on the scars on his neck. How had they replicated that? "Dahlia."

I looked at the chains around him. I didn't like seeing him like this. I hated it. I hated that he was cursed with this.

I touched his chains. His eyes followed my hand. His arms struggled in the chains. He didn't stop struggling. His muscles looked like they were going to break the chains at any moment.