"Don't... threaten my mum, Rhys," I groaned, holding onto him.
"What the hell?" Mum gasped, holding herself against the wall. "What is he,"
"You were right, mum," I breathed, "he is, Rhett's dad. But that's not what you were right about, you were right, there was someone in my house. The one you talked to on the phone was Rhys, but the one who invaded my house and left the doors of bedrooms open, who was in the motorbike I told you about, was,"
"Jameson Martens," Niklaus hissed from the inside, coming closer.
"Aunt Cinthya!" Both Niklaus and Adeline greeted her together.
"Rest your voice, Ruby," Rhyot told me softly, striding back into my bedroom, setting me on my bed again, and this time, he sat with me, holding me down, making me stay still, mum followed him inside. "Somehow he learned that Ruby was my weakness and that we had a son together. I didn't know, for the record. He then came after her, messed with her house, put bombs in here, sabotaged all of her cars, including the Lamborghini she was driving yesterday, when she parked here to pack our son's things and take it to him at Leah's."
"Martens?" Her eyes darkened. "The one who sexually abused,"
"Our younger brother," Adeline hissed. "He got pissy because Rhys killed his family to get revenge on what he did and because he tortured him for months."
"Little after you called me, he kidnapped me," I breathed tiredly, and I didn't find it in me to fight Rhys when he took advantage of the situation and laid me on his chest, bringing my arm to his waist, covering us with the blanket, probably because I'm still having shivers, then he began to caress my back as I inhaled his bergamot, coffee, and vetiver scent.
"He called me through her phone, that I tracked to where he was. In the video call, he had her gun pressed against her forehead, and he told me that I had a son with Ruby, Rhett, and that he was going to kill them. When I got there, he seemed to be provoking her about something, and what he said made her realize that the sick fuck was in love with my brother, he got pissed and almost shoot her. I stopped him, Klaus was with me plus some of my people, while Jameson was accompanied by a woman and men, who had infiltrated in Ruby's life."
I held onto him, struggling to keep my eyes open, "He was playing..." I said, "Russian Roulette on me... making me questions about us... so I... kept talking... and talking... to gain Rhys' time. ...He pulled the trigger a handful times... and none of them were it... but the one he was going to... shoot me with... when Rhys came... was the one with the bullet."
"We stopped them," Niklaus said. "Then I cut the ties he had used to tie the Princess to the chair, and quickly she unarmed him, pressed the gun under his chin and exploded his head, then she grabbed another gun and killed the two people who he bought with him. Not satisfied, she grabbed one more gun and emptied on Jameson's corpse. It was beautiful."
"My people have been cleaning it all up," Rhys told mum, caressing me softly, his touch so tender it almost hurt. "I took her to my car and brought her back with Klaus, but she fell asleep on the way here. By the time we got here, she was already burning with the fever, so, I made my people who were waiting in the area check everything to make sure it was safe enough to bring her to her bedroom, when it was, I brought her in, and I've been taking care of her since. Klaus called Addie to tell her about everything in the morning, and since she's been living in Cambridge ever since she went to university there, and it's not that far away from here, she came. She arrived an hour ago."
"My anger drove me here fast," she scoffed. "I can't believe my brother has a son, that he didn't even know, with Ruby motherfucking Sinnott Vaughan!"
Oh? Is that why she was smacking him then?
"From the second she killed them to the moment she fell asleep, Ruby was yelling at Rhys, they discussed their relationship for more than an hour, in a very heated argument from both sides, especially hers. That wound in his pretty forehead," Klaus pointed his right index to it, "was her doing, she hit him with the empty gun twice, when she was yelling at him about the fact that he lied and pretended to be Hayes. I watched it all with a premium seat in first roll."
If I had the strength to it, I would roll my eyes, hard.
"That's my daughter," mum giggled, getting a tired gasp out of me. "I taught her that," she beamed. "That's how you use an empty gun. Cole has always been a pussy, he's a barking a dog, like his father, he doesn't have the guts to actually kill somebody, he just puts up a front that he'll do it. He can only stomach some punches. My Ruby is different, she got my dad's rage, paired with my brain and good looks, and her dad's trust issues, plus some divorce-caused daddy and anger issues, she's quite the dangerous Lady herself. She may not have been raised in the mafia like the three of you, but she has the rage to give birth to a mafia of her own, that's why I was scared she would follow Cole's path."
"Cole's path?" Adeline asked.
"Illegal drugs, alcohol, parties, illegal fights, illegal races, sex addiction."
"Oh," she gasped, "the bad teenager path."
"Yes," mum nodded. "Had she gone down there, this world would be doomed. But, surprisingly, all that my daughter wanted was to stay alone with her books, studying like a pretty nerd, to be number 1 and go to Oxford, to attend English Literature and be a writer. We had a close relationship, I would call her weekly, and she would fill me in on everything. I felt stupid, she wanted nothing with parties, with drugs, with illegal shite, with alcohol, even less with sex. She was too busy daydreaming with her book husbands, as she called, she used to say that no men would be up to her standard, that everyone was boring when compared to the men she read about, and she had no interest in girls."
"She... called me... boring..." I whispered.
"Because, I was wild girl," mum chuckled, "you were boring compared to me. That is, until you turned wilder than me, losing your virginity at 15, and getting pregnant in your second time, with the same boy, who you didn't even know who it was, because you mistook the twins. Ruby, you got pregnant in a locker room," she gasped. "I always wanted to fuck in a locker room, but I, the wild kid, was scared of getting caught. I lost my virginity at 17. What the hell!"
"In the locker room?" Adeline gasped. "The gymnasium locker room?"
"In my defense," Rhys groaned, "I was going through a moment and she happened to be the reason of the moment I was going to through, then as in a play of fate, she passed right by the guys locker room. I had just gotten out of the bath, and I was angry, with me for what was happening, with her for not realizing I was me and telling me to pretend nothing happened and then going there and confessing to my brother, it... was all bottled up. I was impulsive and grabbed her inside, then locked the door, thankful that it just us, and well," he rolled his shoulders, "I'm not going to elaborate, you know what happened."
"Stop... talking... about... that day!" I groaned embarrassed to death.
"So what now?" Mum growled. "Are you up to being a father to Rhett? You say you are here to stay, will you keep pestering my daughter and have the balls to step up and be the father that my grandson needs? Or will you cause more trouble to my family, Rhyot D. Warner Crowther?"
D? His middle name starts with a D? I didn't even know he had a middle name!
"I've been clear with your daughter, aunt Cinthya, and I'll be with you. I am not going anywhere, I will stay, and I will be present, I'll move to London, and I'll be with her and our son. I wasn't around because I didn't know I had a son, had I known, I would have moved to London to be with them a long fucking time ago. Even if she says she doesn't want or need me around, I don't give a fuck, I'll stay, I'll protect her and Rhett, and you... as the collateral damage," mum winced at how he called her and I struggled with the urge to laugh, "and nothing, will make me go away. I've always wanted to be a dad, to have a son, so, I'll be a dad to him!"
"Collateral damage?" Mum hissed.
"Oh, don't give me that shite, aunt Cinthya, you made her stay away from me, you told her that I'm from the mafia, and you scared her about it!" He snapped.
She clenched her jaw, "I thought you would be dangerous to her, to them."
"You thought wrong. In fact, you shouldn't have butt in, it was about me and her, had she come and told us that she was pregnant, I would have stepped up. I would have moved to the UK to attend Oxford instead, because I was accepted in it, for a matter of fact. I would have told her the truth then. But you made her head, you made her stay quiet, scaring her about my family's background."
Mum looked uncomfortable, "She's my daughter."
"She's the mom of my son."
"Is that all that she is to you?" Mum pressed and I wanted to stop her.
"No, she is way more than that," he growled at her, like a cornered animal.
"Mum... stop..." I tried.
"Then will you put up an effort to win her over this time?" She ignored me.
"I fucking will, and I've made that clear to her already."
"Please... stop... it..."
"Then you better be bloody serious about her, Rhyot, because my daughter deserves to be official, owned, loved, to have a ring on her finger, and a serious change in her marital status. So, you better come in the picture with the honest desire to win her over and to marry her, or I will sabotage you. And so will my grandson, because he may want a father, but he wants his mum happy, more."
"I have all the intentions in making her mine, aunt Cinthya, I assure you!"
Those were the last words I heard before losing consciousness again.