Chapter 477) Nothing

A wolf is no less a wolf because he’s dressed in sheepskin and the devil is no less the devil because he’s dressed as an angel.”

LeCrae

Del Sol Valley
Villa ViVa
(current residence of Vivien and Liam Cameron)

I look up from drying off my hands into a face in the mirror before me, a face I barely recognize, and not only because it is freshly scrubbed and makeup free, a rare sight even for myself since I have been about 14ish and first was allowed to wear makeup, but because I feel like I have changed too much for my own good. I no longer see AG, Aria-Grace, just someone faintly resembling her. No, I am not freaking out because I am getting old, good grief, I just only turned 29. In fact, I always feel younger than my age, making it really hard to fill all those big shoes life presented me with.

I was often called a natural beauty and my parents’ amazing genes probably did give me a leg up on many girls, but as pop icon ViVa’s daughter, I always felt like I had to bring my A-game, visually and with the things I achieve, just like my mom always had and still does.

My brother never seemed to feel any pressure about any of that. He and dad had always been somehow disconnected from all the fame and unspoken rules and demands. Plus, both men were effortlessly handsome and just perfect in their self-chosen place in the background of this larger-than-life superstar diva my mom had always been, even long before she ever got famous she had been a queen in all but title. I envied them, dad and Nick, I do, for being able to resist getting sucked into the fame-game with mom like I had. I have always been more like mom. And mom always had me front and center with her. And then I married a Crown Prince … I couldn’t fly under any radars anymore if I were invisible. I’d never know a normal life without someone always taking photos and note of everything I say or do the moment I step out into public. That ship had long sailed for me. Oh well, I am not complaining. There are worse fates. We all fall prey to the grass being greener elsewhere idea.

Reaching for my makeup travel kit with a deep sigh I apply my usual standard routine with rehearsed motions.

It doesn’t take me long, and considering why I came here I don’t even bother with shading and contouring, just want to look healthy and good enough to avoid everyone I may run into asking me if I feel all right.

Whenever someone asks me that I always smile as convincingly as I can and tell them I am fine. Just like mom always had, I learned all my coping mechanisms from her. Smile and rise above the pain, don’t show them you are vulnerable, even if you are breaking inside. The perpetual masks we wear so long that we forget who we were beneath them.

I am so far from all right, I don’t even know what being okay really feels like anymore. I will again, one day, that I am sure of, because I have the most amazing family.

But right now, I am not okay.

And nobody but me knows why.
Not because I don’t trust my parents, I do, with my life even. I can’t tell them the truth because it would hurt them, and because I am afraid of the avalanche it would kick loose.

So, for now, at first glance I am just a daughter visiting her parents. For several weeks. Also, not surprising considering their amazing mansion in the Del Sol Valley hills.

Like I said, my big brother Nick has always flown under the radar. He lives a normal life, nobody bothers him. I never had that freedom. All eyes on me, always, since I was little. I needed a bodyguard since I was a child. Nick NEVER had one. Still doesn’t. And we’ve always been close. Even when our parents were going through rough patches.

So, here I am here escaping it all, fled to my parents to find myself again.

I can already hear the “which mother could just leave her kids behind?!” screams with the exasperated huffs. Yeah, maybe if I were on the outside looking in, I would feel the same. Then again, it’s not a school break, my kids are with their father and both have a ton of extracurricular interests, it would have been wrong to just take them with me, not to mention that I am mentally not in the best place to be a good and solid mother. I had to do this for me, I had to get away, NOW. I needed this. For me. For my sanity. NOW.

So, what happened, you wonder. What could make this poor little rich girl so sad? Did she break a fingernail, huh? Or did her husband not buy her enough bling? A girl like me could not possibly have any real problems, right? Maybe her husband cheated on her? Usually when wives run without their families, it’s something the husband did. So, what could the handsome and always so well-composed and soft-spoken, always prim and proper perfect gentleman former king-to-be Maximilian Edward Henry Cromwell, Count of Henfordshire, have done to make me run?

The answer is as easy as it is confusing.

Nothing.

Maximilian did nothing, which ended up being the exact opposite of what I expected and also the final straw. Him doing nothing was the thing that hurt me the most. And nothing was what he expected me to do about what happened to me. Not to mention the part where he kind of blamed me. That part was what ultimately sent me over the edge. Unforgivable.

In order for you to understand me better before I tell you what that ‘nothing’ he is so guilty of, a matter which I fully expect you to side with me about by the way, allow me to give a bit more background first.

Max has two younger siblings, Genevieve and Leopold, both of whom he had never been close with and by that I mean they were practically strangers sharing the same DNA growing up in the same home, a lot of jealousy and animosity between them.

It wasn’t until the more recent years when everyone was already married with kids that the siblings started to try and get closer, get to know each other. If you ask me, they will never have what my family and I have, but if makes them happy to pretend … My personal feelings on the entire Cromwell bloodline aren’t what they used to be anymore anyway, but if you care what I think, I’m more than happy to share. My husband is a handsome, polite, charming bag of dicks and a spineless wimp, his goodie-two-shoes sister is a pretentious bitch, who seems sugary-sweet and nice until you turn your back to her, her husband is the epitome of Tartosian macho who loves nothing more than himself, Max’ brother is a misogynistic waste of skin and his wife a total bore, whose interpretation of calm and composed always make her seem sedated! Then again, being married to Leopold Cromwell, it requires heavy sedation to keep anyone from running from him on sight. Sorry, my inner Cameron is showing. Can take a girl away from her family but can’t take the Cameron out of the girl!

Sooooo, all that only to say that while Max was busy with all the engagements that came with being the highest-ranking nobleman of Henford-on-Bagley again, I was alone a lot. No, correction: I was lonely. I took up hobby after hobby, my beloved music, which once again had become just a pastime rather than my career because a Countess Cromwell does not have a real job, so, my calling was now once more just for entertaining guests with pleasant background music, just like I once swore I would never let happen again. Yet, here we were, me stepping back into the role of a supportive wife, doting mother and overall arm candy so my very undeserving husband could be happy again.

The same husband who along with his late father had forced me into motherhood long before I was ready and while I loved my kids, I just wasn’t getting the fulfillment from being someone’s mother the way other women do. I was frustrated. Strange, come to think of it, it always seemed that Max and I could never both be truly happy. Sure, we loved each other and were happy together, but anything beyond that had always been one of us losing themselves well beyond the usual compromises to make the other happy. Definite food-for-thought.

I am trailing off again.

Well, someone who had lots of time on their hands was Max’s brother Leopold, a grown man and reluctant father himself now, who never held a job a day in his life and always lived a life of luxury and leisure, first on his parents’ money, then his wife’s. During one of my walks through the rolling hills of Henfordshire he and I ran into each other, so he offered to accompany me.

I was surprised, but kinda glad not to spend the day talking to myself again. So, we walked. And walked. He played tour guide and showed me some remote ruins and told me their stories.

At first that was fun and interesting. Max and I used to do that a lot before he got so busy again playing Henford-on-Bagley’s finest. I would almost go as far as to admit I actually enjoyed Leopold’s company.

Until I didn’t anymore. I will spare you the gory details, mostly for my own sake, but Leopold raped me. Just like that. No warning, he never even as much as winked at me flirtatiously. I never saw it coming, I couldn’t stop it, and when he was done, he just left me laying there like roadside trash while he headed home to his wife.

It took me hours to collect myself enough to scramble through endless fields and meadows find my way home and when I did, I went straight to Max and told him what his brother had just done to me. It took several attempts, as I was shaking and sobbing and losing my mind. He held me, but when he finally understood what I was telling him, he let go of me and did that one thing I think I may never be able to forgive him for.

I saw him tense up, then he asked with a completely flat voice, filled of doubts and jealousy

“What were you doing alone in the ruins with him in the first place?”

“Wha-what?” I had asked, genuinely confused by his reaction.

“You never liked Leopold, you two barely speak a sentence to each other whenever we all meet, and you always told me you preferred walking alone. Why would you go with Leopold to the ruins? Anyway, either way, this is to be kept to just us. I will talk to my brother myself, no law enforcement. We cannot afford bad publicity withing the Cromwell family so close after having been reinstated. Too much at stake, we have to handle this ourselves.”

I tore away from him, staring at him in utter disbelief, his face unusually tense and distrustful and I swear, had he punched me right in the face I would have found that a LOT more forgivable than being kinda-sorta dismissing how I had been violated and what to me sounded like implying it was my own fault and worse, demanding I sweep it under the rug.

Coming from a family of hot heads, Max’ Buddhist monk like calmness had always irked me a little, but it was just another punch to my gut now, in a time like this, any woman wants their man to make her feel protected and see him do right by her by getting revenge for the wrongs done to her.

Max did nothing, didn’t emote, didn’t get angry at his brother nor drive over to Leopolds’ home to punch his lights out, nope, all he had done was passively-aggressively accuse me of leaving myself vulnerable for something like that, basically asking for it. His brother obviously was at no fault. Of course, nobody would expect Max to want to kick his brother into next year. No, my husband did nothing. Just like he did nothing when I was forced to obey my contractual obligations to become a mother at 22, no matter how much I begged him to side with me. Nope, not at 22 and not again at 23, even though he had promised me one was plenty, until his father, the King, pointed out that I was obligated to produce 3 viable heirs. Luckily royalty as a concept collapsed before they could force me into having a third child. He did nothing when everyone started to tell me what to wear, how to walk, when to talk and how to do so. He did nothing when his family stripped away every layer of what used to be ‘me’, until nothing of me was left. Whenever I needed him most, Max did NOTHING.

I left him standing there, locked myself in the bathroom, took the world’s longest shower, scrubbing myself till my skin was raw and hurt. I waited till I knew Max was busy tucking in the kids, when I rushed to pack a bag, and by that I mean frantically tossing some underwear and cosmetics into a small carryon bag, just the few essentials I could grab quickly, then took Max’ favorite car to the airport, leaving it in the no parking zone so it would be towed, while I was getting on the very first plane home.

HOME.

Home to my mom and dad in Del Sol Valley. Home to my real family, related by blood and DNA, people who were warm, even though some of them weren’t even technically alive by our standards. Home to where even my beloved first car, a fun pink convertible I received for my 16th birthday, still in pristine condition with few miles, sat waiting for me as if I was on summer break and would go back to high school after.

Home.

I didn’t call ahead, didn’t text, just showed up.

Dad opened the door, called for my mom and both just knew I needed my family and no questions so they just hugged me long and tight. It felt so good. Like a homecoming should.

The welcome was warm and made me feel like teenage me, coming home from college for a longer visit. As if Nick, Addy and Rohan would be on a plane out to join us the next day so they old crew could hang out. Like we had done so many times back when.

Oh Rohan.

My first love. And probably the man I would always love. The man I had loved so deeply, so intensely, until he broke both our hearts when realizing he was gay. I know some people believe it’s a choice, I know that’s BS, cos if it were, Rohan would have chosen me. I will never NOT go to sleep remembering how he proposed to me on that lake that one winter …

If only … oh, if only! But gay or not, Rohan would NEVER have raped me. The calmest and kindest person I have ever met.

Yes, this is my life.

So glamorous at first glance, but in reality, everything is convoluted, nothing makes real sense, I am so lost. I look down on myself and sigh, as I see my mom’s clothing. It’s nice, fits well, and it is not that Cromwell style I had been forced to wear again. Mom’s got great taste. Very similar to mine. It makes me feel seen, like myself again.

Then – a knock on the door, without waiting for my invite mom and dad enter, by the serious expression on their faces I can tell this is going to be a rough talk. Once more I feel like a teen girl about to get a talking to.

“My angel baby, daddy and I have been talking and want you to know and always remember that this house may look differently now after the remodel than it did when you and Nick were growing up here, but it will always be your home too. One word and that big guestroom down the hall is YOUR room again. Indefinitely. That being said, daddy and I are wondering …” mom starts, her voice unusually soft and gentle.

“Don’t! Please don’t.” I beg, but now dad takes over. The parental tag team is the worst. I remember it well.

“AG … your mom and I know something happened. And if your mom guessed right … AG, did Max …. did he … hurt you?” dad says and I can tell, one word from me and he’d port to HOB and beat Max and his brother into next year.

But I can’t lie. Not to mommy and daddy. Horrified, I stare at mom, who tells me

“Baby, daddy and I saw the bruises when you were swimming earlier.”

‘AH crap!’ I think, panicked. I had been so careful to cover up more than the sunny and balmy weather in DSV required, but got weak at that amazing pool. Darn it.

“AG …?” my dad’s eyes have that glare in them which he gets when he is about to be very upset.

If I didn’t tell him the truth now, he may just run with what he thinks is the truth and go do something everyone would regret. And truth be told, while Nick and I have come to terms with having vampire parents, I still don’t really understand what exactly that means in all facets, but I do know vampires can be very dangerous. Not to us, they would never hurt Nick or me. But I also know that even as mortals both my parents had terribly hot tempers, and vampires experience emotions in some magnified way as their senses are heightened. I really don’t want to be the reason my children might end up half-orphaned. If dad loses it and some vampire instincts take over him, I’d prefer he’d take out the real perpetrator. Pardon my French, but fuck Leopold!

Besides, as much as I am disappointed in Max, I don’t want my dad – or worse yet, my mom – to believe their grandkid’s father was who did this to me. They deserve the truth, to know who did what and why I can’t forgive. My mask falls. Now I don’t feel like a teen girl anymore, but as if I had aged to twice my age in only minutes. I feel old, tired, weak. Vulnerable. And I no longer hide it.

I start telling them my story, shocked myself how emotionless I speak, not even a single tear, as if I was talking about a terrible book I read, not my own horrifying experience.

Throughout most of it all I had stared at the carpet in the guest room, now I look over at my parents and see both of them crying, right before they both pull me into the tightest hug.

Once we are all done crying together, mom turns to my dad and goes

“Liam.”

He looks at her and nods, evidently some secret parent code, then heads out of the room, while mom takes me to her and dad’s bathroom to clean me up like a little girl. Our efforts undone several times by spontaneous sobs from both of us. I cry, mom cries. Oh mommy.

But she keeps trying to clean away my pain and sorrow with her sinfully expensive skincare lines.

I let her.

It feels good, as if she is cleaning away some of that odd shame I feel now, the disappointment in Max and in myself, and it makes me feel safe and her feel like she is able to do something about what happened to her little girl. Dad leaving the room makes me nervous, but mom assures me he went to his office and nowhere else.

Later, as mom and I are in the living room sharing strong drinks, dad comes downstairs looking all business carrying a thick manila folder.

He places the thick folder on the table next to me, tops it with a red pen he smoothly pulls from his shirt pocket, then gently takes the glass from me placing it down on the bar, as he takes both my hands in his, looking at me as he says

“Read through this, my sweet angel, take your time, add things you want, take off things you don’t. When you are done, we’ll sit down together.” he tells me, his eyes gentle, but his usually full lips pressed together making them thin like lines.

Turning my head, I pull away one hand from dad to lift the cover of the folder and reveal something which as the daughter and little sister of lawyers I instantly recognized as a legal document.

‘Petition for dissolution of marriage’, I read out loud.

My head snaps up at dad, and I never seen him more determined.

“You are not going back to that man! He failed to protect you; he failed you, and me, and your mother and Nick, he no longer deserves you and lost all privileges with us. I have the good mind to call up Caelan and chat with him about your brother-in-law! But I won’t, because of you and my grandkids. Anyway, Nick is on his way here too, to help me look over the custody things, since he deals with that more than I do and because this crosses borders. Also, AG, your official place of residence is here in this house again, effective immediately, until further notice.” he states, and there is finality in his voice.