After she learned what he had done to her, she didn’t know how to feel about this brother of hers. She still liked him, she still thought of him as her brother, but he was not her favorite person anymore. He harmed and betrayed her, no matter what his reason.
“Can we talk for a while, Zuri?” Rhett’s voice was as soft as she remembered it, he used to bring comfort to her.
“What do you want to talk about?”
“About the beauty blood.” He knew that Zuri already learned about it, thus there was nothing to hide anymore. He was going to be blunt with her. “I am sure, you already knew what is
that.”
The next part was something that Rhett didn’t expect, because Zuri slapped him so hard, he stumbled a few steps back and looked at his sister with wide eyes.
“You used me. I thought you care about me.” The betrayal stung.
‘Now you know how it felt to be betrayed, right? It’s karma, Zuri. Your karma for betraying me.’
Xaden appeared out of thin air, it had been a while since Zuri saw him and the sight of him only fueled her anger even more.
‘Why you look like that, my dear mate? Karma bites your ass? I like biting your ass and you know that.’
His laughter filled the empty hallway and Zuri was seeing red with the lewd comment he gave to her. She just felt better recently, she thought she would get better, but this man appeared before her eyes again and ruined it. Everything seemed to go back to that dark place.
“Shut up! Shut up!” Zuri faced Xaden, but he only laughed even more, mocking her with a few lewd comments about her body.
Meanwhile, Rhett immediately understood what was going on when Zuri screamed at empty spot. He was not angry with the slap, he deserved it. But, right now he needed to get Zuri back so they could talk properly about the beauty blood.
From what Elijah told him, Khaos was reluctant to continue with the curses and tried to buy time. The attachment must have gotten to him and because Khaos didn’t have his own destined mate, this attachment to the Shell must be close to one.
He was being protective of Zuri without him realizing it and it could setback their plan.
Zuri was not Khaos’s destined mate and his attachment to her wouldn’t do any good for the plan, since the Shell was bound to be hurt in the end and Khaos’s overprotectiveness that started to show wouldn’t help with the situation.
“Zuri, look at me.” Rhett approached her carefully, she looked like she was going to lose it and he knew she was capable of fighting him. “That’s not real. Whatever you are seeing is not
real.”
Zuri turned her head and now her attention was on Rhett.
“Do you want to get rid of the hallucination? Do you want to know how to help alpha Khaos?
You care about him, right?”
Since Khaos was the last lycan, it meant he would never find his destined mate, thus his attachment to the Shell was the closest thing to it.
And that was the fact that made Rhett worried the moment Khaos started to show his overprotective side toward Zuri. The lycan was known to be very protective to their mate, to their family. They would never step out of the bond that they created with their other half.
And from the look of it, Khaos unconsciously had created that bond with Zuri. The attachment that they felt for each other helped in that case.
Therefore, when Elijah told Rhett about how Khaos was reluctant for inflicting the curse on Zuri, he knew what would happen if he didn’t intervene.
If they couldn’t talk to Khaos, then the only option was letting Zuri to want it. Rhett knew his sister…
“If you really cared about him, you will make his goal as your mission to achieve too, Zuri.” Rhett paused for a while to gauge her reaction and when she didn’t say anything, he continued.
He was going on to tell her about the curses that they wanted to inflict on her. Eight curses in a row, which would leave them with only twelve curses and they hope by the end of spring, they would have perfected the beauty blood.
It would be a tremendous help for Khaos in order to revive the old dynasty.
“The Verity Stamp, the golden stamp, will be in alpha Khaos’s hands too by that time and I am sure of it.” Rhett ended his long explanation. He looked at her in the eyes and waited for her reaction.
“I used to think that you love me, Rhett, but I think I have been mistaken all this time. All of your affection to me this whole time is because you wanted to use me. Have you ever genuinely loved me as your sister? Or have I been alone all this time?”
Zuri thought she knew her brother, but as it turned out the person before her was completely someone that she didn’t recognize at all.
‘Karma is a bitch! How it feels to be stabbed by someone that you trusted?’
This time, it was her father that appeared out of thin air, he mocked her about how it ran in the family to backstabbing each other.
“This is another life lesson for you my dear daughter. Now you know how it felt to be betrayed by your own blood.’
Alpha laughed merrily, pointing his finger at Zuri, bending his body when he saw the look on her face, chanting the word ‘karma, karma…’ over and over again, taunting her.
And Xaden joined him.
And her mother joined them.
“STOP!” Zuri screamed on the top of her lungs, as she shut her eyes closed and covered her ears. She couldn’t see them, but she still could hear their voices in her head and this drove her insane. She was indeed crazy.
She spent so long to deny it, but the truth was always in front of her eyes. She was crazy.
“What are you doing?!” Gayle pushed Rhett away from Zuri when he watched her breaking down and Caiden was right behind him.
Both of them came here to get Zuri, because the alpha wanted her in the fortress to see how everything unfolded.
However, they saw this sight instead.
They were not sure what happened, but they could see whatever Rhett was trying to say to Zuri had agitated her.
“Back off, Rhett!” Gayle growled at him and Caiden came to Zuri, but she was not in the right mind, thus when he touched her, she took this as an attack and her first instinct was to defense herself.
Her claws elongated and she was so close to cut Caiden’s throat if it was not for Gayle, who pulled him away from her.
Gayle had spent weeks training with Zuri, therefore he knew her move rather well and based on his experience, it was way better not to get close to her whenever she was not in fully control of herself.
The warrior did not only get his ass kicked, but he almost got serious injuries if he didn’t have a quick reaction to her attack.
“Don’t get close to her,” Gayle warned Caiden and both of them kept their distance from Zuri.
“What have you done to her?” Caiden asked Rhett through his gritted teeth. “She was fine.” Zuri looked more of herself in the past few days and for her to break down like this when Rhett was here, there must be something that this man had done to her.
However, instead of answering their question, Rhett decided to walk away from the situation. “I will see you in the fortress,” he said then left.
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