Chapter 104

Sylvia’s POV

After the longest week I’ve suffered through for a very long time, Mom and I finally get back to the estate. All week I’ve missed my brothers, and I’m downright furious with them right now. They promised they would answer my calls and text me all weekend.

Yet, other than a spare text now and then, I had barely heard from them at all. No phone calls. Sporadic responses. What could they have possibly been doing that was so important they couldn’t even talk to me?

When I’m with them, they act like I’m the most important person in the world to them. What a load of lies.

Stepping out of the car, I’m ready to give them a piece of my mind. Only… they aren’t there. We’re alone in the driveway, aside from a few servants, but they hardly count for anything.

Did I not text them and tell them we were on our way? Were they not waiting by the window?

Didn’t they miss me at all?

I’m annoyed. Crossing my arms, I tap my feet, counting the seconds until one of them actually gets out here and apologizes to me.

The servants look at me with some confusion. Usually by now I’ve given them a ton of orders by now. Even Mom seems confused, looking at me strangely before she starts asking the servants to care for our luggage.

Then, finally, Conrad appears with the others behind him, coming out of the house.

“Sylvia!” Hugh calls. “Mother!”

Conrad reaches me first and pulls me in for a hug. I don’t hug him back. When he pulls back, he asks, “What’s wrong?”

The same thing happens for each of the four brothers. They come in to hug me, but I refuse to return any of their attention.

They each pull away with a question in their eyes. Yet none of them have an apology ready.

What the hell!

“Sylvia?” Wes asks, the last to hug and be given the cold shoulder. “Is something the matter?”

Finally, I break down. If they don’t have the care for me to guess what’s bothering me, then I guess I’m going to have to tell them.

But I’m not going to make it pretty.

“Yes, something’s the matter. Thank you for actually noticing!” I snap.

Wes’s eyes go a little wide. “Did we do something wrong?”

“Where the hell have you been all week? You promised that you would be only a phone call away, yet you hardly ever got back to me. I was constantly on the outs. Do you have any idea how that made me feel?”

“We didn’t mean to make you feel that way…” Wes says, while side-eyeing his brothers.

Conrad clears his throat. “We were just… busy…”

What the hell kind of answer is that? “Don’t you care about me anymore?” I ask. Angry tears well in my eyes.

“Of course we do!” Hugh says, inching closer.

“You have a terrible way of showing it!” I say. “What could you possibly have been so busy with?”

Again, rather than answer me, they look at each other. They are keeping secrets!

“I thought we were closer than this,” I say, then push through them toward the house. The brothers chase along behind me.

“It’s not what you think, Sylvia,” Conrad says.

“Then tell me the truth!” I demand. As I reach the front door, I swivel to face them. “Where were you? What was so much more important than me?!”

Again, they refuse to answer, and again my anger spikes even higher. I turn again, and storm into the house.

In my rage, I grab the nearby vase off the table in the entryway, and shove it straight onto the ground. When it hits the marble, it shatters into a million pieces in a satisfying crash. It’s not enough though. I want to enjoy putting someone down, making them feel smaller than I do right now.

Not just any servant will do. Servants always feel small.

I need someone who thinks she’s better than me. Take her down a peg or two.

“Ollie!” I scream. “Get here and clean this!”

One of the servants comes nearer to clean, but I shove them away. “Only Ollie can clean this!”

Behind me, my brothers watch with severe expressions. With a sigh, Conrad tells the servant, “Do as she says.”

Ollie’s POV

Sylvia must be in a hell of a mood. Any hopes I had that she might have come back from her trip a little happier immediately go up in smoke.

Instead, she’s already shattered a vase and called for me to go pick up the pieces. One of the servants hands me a dustpan and a broom on my way to the entryway.

“Mind yourself, Ollie,” she says. “She’s at her worst.”

I brace myself as best I can as I come out of the stairwell and round the corner toward the entryway. There, Sylvia stands, her arms crossed, fire in her eyes. The four brothers stand behind her like protective bodyguards.

At her feet are the shattered remnants of a once beautiful vase.

Immediately I lower myself to start cleaning. I don’t want to start anything with Sylvia, and the sooner this is done, the sooner I can go back to avoiding her entirely.

“You didn’t even say hello,” Sylvia sneers. “Is that any way to greet me after I’ve been gone for so long?”

She didn’t say hello to me either, but I know pointing that out will only land me in even bigger trouble, so instead, I just say, “Welcome back, Sylvia.”

“That’s better,” Sylvia says and kicks some of the shards at me.

“Careful not to hurt yourself, Sylvia,” Wes tells her.

It hurts, seeing him care for Sylvia, while I am the one down on my hands and knees with the broken shards. Just as I predicted back at the island, as soon as we let, the brothers went back to their usual routine, showering all of their attention on Sylvia while entirely avoiding me.

With her around, I bet they aren’t even thinking of their Angel anymore.

Lowering my head, I continue to pick up the pieces while the others watch, some more closely than others. Declan and Conrad look bored. Wes is fussing over Sylvia. But Hugh…

Hugh is watching me rather closely.

In a flash, before I can truly react, he is beside me. Grabbing my arm, he yanks me up.

“Hugh?”

He pinches my chin between his thumb and forefinger and turns my face up and to the side, revealing my neck…

I’ve done my best to cover the love bites that remain from the island vacation, but some of them are deeper and redder than others.

He inspects one now, one that he himself made on my neck, and then looks up at my face like I’m some kind of puzzle that he’s trying to piece together that he’s missing the pieces of.

Leaning in, he gently sniffs at my neck.

“What are you doing?” Sylvia shrieks. “Let her get back to her work, Hugh.”

Sylvia’s shrill voice seems to wake him from whatever revelry he’s in. Immediately he drops me and I tumble back down to the ground in a heap. It’s a miracle I don’t cut myself on any of the remaining shards.

Hugh doesn’t say anything. No explanation. No apology.

He just turns and walks away.

Watching him leave, my heart breaks all over again.

What had that been about?