18: Eve Is Next

Flavian.

At first I thought it was the baby, but watching Eve let herself into Danielle's room, I knew something wasn't right and I had just the right champagne to digest the upcoming drama.

10 p.m. The Waldorf household had settled at a family hotel, the grand one in London. While some relatives were present, the rest were back at the estate, surely throwing a party. That's okay. Not everyone is subjected to mourn. That's why I instructed my men to shoot down the party there so they'll willingly mourn in silence.

I poured myself two glasses of champagne, drowning one glass while swirling the other. I proceeded to march up to my desk where I had laid out my devices. As the chief of security, every Sunday is Monday. No day is a holiday. The well-being of not just this family but the Mafia rests on my shoulders, and my shoulders had gotten used to it since I was fourteen.

Gazing at CCTV tape clips on the screen, I monitored everyone's room from different angles until my eyes locked on one room.

Danielle was in the room. Every room had a room ID card backed up with other security systems to make sure no room was easily accessible. Eve knew this and that's why she pickpocketed Keaton’s master ID card at the funeral.

He wouldn't notice because I slipped my own in to cover up for Eve without reason.

Judging by the movement of their lips, they were arguing. I tuned up the volume after wearing my headset.

"You betrayed my mother. You betrayed me."  

Eve’s voice was raspy, harsh but controlled. She was angry, visibly, but her demeanor was calm. 

"Eve, what are you on about all of a sudden?" Danielle was backing the camera but she sounded gentle. She wasn't. It was a facade she wore so much it vexed me. Can't go killing an innocent woman now, can we?

"God rest the soul of my mother. She suffered so much... All for a lost course. Now she's gone. Who's gonna protect you... Who's gonna protect your b.a.s.t.a.r.d sons, hmm?"

Oh, that line. Did she have to stress the word "bastard"? Here I am smirking like it was one of my savage lines that had people at my throat to kill me.

"Eve!!! You'll stop talking. Make your way out at once."

I said it. Eve was just like me. I've known Danielle for a long, long time. She's a thorn in the flesh, she stuck all her masks so well that you couldn't tell which face was real. She almost had no trigger point, but I'm a man who's equally a thorn in the flesh. If you didn't have any trigger point, I'd make one for you and use it against you—what Eve did right here.

I do not know how she knows, but she knows and is probably still in the process of knowing.

"You shouldn't have-"  

She paused, her eyes looking above Danielle's shoulder to glare directly at the micro cam hiding in the corner. She knew someone was watching. I was watching.

In such a short time her senses have sharpened indeed, which amazes me.

"You shouldn't have laid with my father those years ago and my mother shouldn't have protected you or your secrets."  

Eve snapped her eyes away from me to stare at Danielle.

Her demons were ready to rip the bitch to pieces but she maintained a neutral expression, turning to leave when Danielle clasped her wrist, shoving her back.

"Eve... What will you do?"

She didn't give Danielle the chance to cling. She reversed the grip, twisting Danielle’s arm behind her back and gripping her hair tightly, that Danielle was gritting her teeth to muffle the groans. Eve leaned in, angling her neck next to her ear, and whispered something into her ear, all this while glaring into the CCTV, into me.

The door slammed shut a few seconds later and I took off my headset, putting a call through to my deputy security chief to hand over things to him for the night. Because my 'beloved' would be at my door at any minute.

As expected, at the time I sipped the champagne, I heard a strong knock on my door. Silly—she could have just rung the doorbell.  

I raised a brow of 'surprise' when I opened the door. She pushed me aside, strutting in like she owned the room.  

"You knew..."  

Her voice trailed off as she started taking off her clothes. I shut the door, keying in a code to lock it.

I locked the door and stayed by it with my back turned, not because I developed some moral sense of decency or abstinence. Because if I did... She might not leave this room with those two legs that led her in.

"Whether it's eight years or eight months, you remain the same... why?"

"Oh, what do I know." I chuckled deviously, bringing the champagne to my lips.

I was going to have a sip but the drink almost spilled at the sudden jerk my body made when she rounded her arms around my waist. 

She's not mine. I reminded myself. Although I've been on a mission for over eight years, I never stopped watching Eve. I grew to know her from a distance, since she was a kid... But those eight years are different. I felt robbed of something. It doesn't have a name yet but it exists.

"You know my mother. You know her husband fucked her cousin. You know Frederick and Eric... Tell me, Uncle, how much do you know?" She questioned, resting her head on my shoulder, pressing in with a bare chest, naked.

"I know enough to sleep peacefully at night. You, on the other hand, you don't get enough sleep... Could it be-"

"-You, Uncle. It's you... you, you. Because of you. Why do you have to show up randomly after eight years?"

She speaks like this and does that. Now she's unzipping my dress pants with ease. I never consented and she never asked. This game is all too familiar, nostalgic. I quenched the thirst in my throat with the champagne.

My hands were occupied, with one on a wooden cane and the other... Fuck the glass. I threw it to the wall, smirking as it crumbled to pieces. Eve is next...

I'll break her into pieces.