Ruthless knight

Jace shoots me a death glare. 

“Praying.” I cough. “Bet she was praying real good.”  

I make a mental note to find that video and check out her praying skills myself. 

Jace flips the pancake on the stove and looks at the clock. “Can one of you go upstairs and get Liam? Breakfast will be ready soon.” 

“Not it,” Bianca and I utter at the same time. 

“Fine—” He starts to say, but the front door opens. 

Tension fills the space the moment our father steps into the kitchen.

Jace despises him. In fact, I’d say he hates him as much as I hate Liam. 

Bianca and I tolerate him, but only because he buys us cool shit. 

Planting a fake smile on his face, he looks around. 

He has a habit of doing this weird thing where he forgets our family is as fucked up as it is. 

Kind of like how he forgets he has kids when he’s gone all the time. 

“Oh, wow. What’s all this?”

 Jace glares at him. “What does it look like?” 

“Right, well. It smells really good.” Averting his gaze, he playfully messes up Bianca’s hair. “Thank you, Jace.” 

He always treats Jace like the hired help around here. 

But it’s the way Mom treated him too. 

The entire world has been placed on his shoulders ever since she died. 

Most days I forget the reason Bianca, Liam, and I are able to have a childhood is because Jace gave up his. 

It would be nice if Jason Covington realized that too and stepped up to be a parent. 

 “Whatever.” Jace tosses the spatula on the counter. “I’m go

Jace trudges up the stairs…leaving us alone with the sperm donor. 

“So, anything interesting happening at school?”

Bianca picks her cuticles. “No, not really.” 

He looks at me. “What about you? How’s football?”

“I have no idea…it’s spring.” 

He laughs nervously. “What can I say? Time keeps getting ahead of me.” He rubs his chin. “But you know what? I’m go

I won’t hold my breath. He has yet to attend a single one. 

Meanwhile, Jace never misses them. 

“If you say so.” 

He turns back to Bianca. “How’s studying been going?”

“Fine.” She purses her lips. “Can I have money to go shopping? I really want new shoes and some nail polish.” 

His face lights up. Unlike Bianca who is the spitting image of our mom, and Jace who is a weird mixture of the two, Liam and I favor him with our green eyes and pale Irish skin. 

I hate it. 

“Sure, sweetie. Let me know when you want to go and I’ll give Mrs. Garcia my card.”

 “Jace said he wants to take us to the mall today.”

“I guess I’ll just give it to Jace then.” His eyes widen. “On second thought, how would you guys feel if I cleared my schedule and tagged along?” 

Bianca nearly chokes on her drink. “Really?”

“Are you feeling okay?” I can’t recall him ever taking off work to spend time with us. Which can only mean one thing. “Did you get fired?” 

Bianca turns ashen. “Do you have cancer?”

He laughs. “No, I didn’t get fired. And no, I don’t have cancer. I own the company and I’m allowed to take a day off whenever I want.” 

Baffled, Bianca looks at me. “Oh.” 

He plucks an apple from the fruit basket. “So, sport. Is there anything you need me to buy you at the mall?”

I hate when he calls me sport. 

However, I love it when he gets me stuff.

I drum my fingernails on the table, thinking. “Not really, but there is a football camp I want to go to this summer. It’s really expensive though since it’s run by a guy who was in the NFL.” 

“Consider it done.”

“You look guilty, Dad,” Bianca says while watching him closely. “Did you do something bad?”

Her question takes him by surprise, and he starts choking on his apple. “No. Of course not. I just want to spend time with my kids is all.” He looks at me. “Can you think of anything Jace might want? I know how hard he works around here, and I want to do something nice for him.”

“Yeah.” I start ticking things off on my fingers. “He’s go

“Whoa, hold on, sport. What happened to the ones he has now?” 

“Liam took a bat to them,” Bianca informs him. 

His mouth opens in shock. “What? Why—”

A loud piercing wail cuts him off. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say there was a wounded animal upstairs. 

“Dad!” Jace yells, his voice cracking. “Dad, I need you. Something’s wrong with Liam!”

My stomach hits the floor. Jace hasn’t called him dad in years. 

This is bad. Real fucking bad. 

I’m on my feet before anyone else. 

Maybe Liam did do something stupid last night and he’s hurt. 

Like that time he climbed one of the tall bookshelves in the study, slipped, bashed his head on a corner, and ended up needing five stitches. 

Since I’m the first up the stairs, I’m also the first to reach his room. 

“What happened—”

My blood runs cold. The thing in my chest bottoms out. 

This isn’t like the time Liam got stitches. 

Stitches won’t fix this.

I dig my nails into my palms, convinced this is a nightmare. 

But it’s not. 

Because six feet in front of me is my twin brother…hanging from a rope on his closet door. 

Jace looks even more helpless than Dad did at Mom’s funeral. 

“What—oh, my God,” our father screams, his legs giving out. 

“What’s going on?” Bianca yells down the hall, her footsteps getting closer. 

Intuition takes over and I close and lock the door before she reaches it. 

I can’t let her see this. She’ll have nightmares for the rest of her life. 

She loves her big brother. He’s her favorite. 

“Hey! Let me in!” Bianca screams, pounding on the door. 

“Go downstairs and call 911!” Jace yells. 

It won’t help. Liam is beyond help. 

But it will keep her busy for the time being. 

“We have to cut him down,” Jace says. “We can’t…we can’t leave him...” His eyes well with tears. “Maybe…maybe there’s still time...” 

There isn’t. 

His stiff body has taken on a blue-ish hue, and his eyes are nearly popped out of his skull. 

We can’t save him. No one can. 

Jace looks at our father who’s now curled up in a fetal position on the floor. “Dad.” 

Come on, old man. Pull yourself together. Your kids need you. 

Be a fucking parent for once in your goddamn life. 

But he won’t…he can’t. He doesn’t know how. 

I dig around in my pockets for the pocketknife I keep on me. “I’ll do it.”

I hated him so much…it should be me. 

It won’t be emotional for me like it will be for Jace. Just another task. 

I start to take a step forward…but the green blanket on the floor of the closet snags my attention. 

There’s a piece of it missing. 

I found it on my bedroom floor this morning.

Liam tried to tell me. 

A horrible thought occurs just then. It’s so sick, so twisted, so messed up I’m gasping for air. 

I told him to join her. 

But I didn’t…I didn’t think he’d…

This wasn’t supposed to happen. Liam does things for attention, but this?

I should have checked on him. 

I had that feeling. I know what that feeling means. 

Wiping his tears with his sleeve, Jace snatches the pocketknife out of my hands. “I can do it.”