My Stepbrother's Dirty Little Secret novel Chapter 667

Chapter 667

Why?

Why was she being kind to me?

I hadn’t earned it.

The thought settled into my chest so naturally that it didn’t even feel like a thought anymore.

It felt like a fact.

Mom was gone.

Mama D was gone.

Brianna.

Emma.

Morgan.

One after another.

Everyone I loved either left or disappeared. Maybe… Maybe people weren’t supposed to stay with me. Maybe that was the pattern.

Maybe I was-no. I stopped the thought before it finished but another one took its place.

Raphael.

He deserved someone who wasn’t broken. Someone who didn’t carry grief like it had become another organ inside her body.

Claire reached for another slice of bread, “You sure you don’t want one?”

I shook my head, “I’m sure.”

She didn’t argue. She simply nodded and that almost made it worse for me because she wasn’t angry, she wasn’t impatient, she wasn’t asking for anything back.

She was just… being kind.

Kindness always felt borrowed.

Like eventually someone would remember they had given it to the wrong person and come back to take it away.

Mom never had. She had loved me without asking me to earn it.

The memory hit so suddenly that I had to grip the edge of the counter.

She was the only one.

And now…

She was gone.

A heaviness settled over me. It wasn’t the kind that made you cry. It was the kind that convinced you the world would be better if you stopped asking it for anything.

No comfort.

No love.

No patience.

No second chances.

Because people like me… people like me were exhausting. Eventually everyone figured that out.

I looked at Jules again.

She laughed when Claire cut her sandwich into little triangles. Mom used to do that. Claire didn’t know. She had simply done it.

Jules smiled so brightly that something inside me tightened. She was safe. She was being cared for and that mattered more than anything else.

Claire reached up, smiling, “I’m sorry.”

He kissed her forehead one more time before carefully lowering Aurelia onto the countertop beside Jules.

Aurelia immediately scooted closer to her, “Jules!”

Jules laughed, “You woke up!”

“I wasn’t sleepy anymore.”

The two little girls immediately began whispering to each other about something only they understood.

Vincenzo shifted Killian higher against his shoulder before reaching over and gently pinching Jules’ cheek.

“So…” a faint smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, “You were hungry enough to wake the whole house?

Jules giggled, “My tummy was.”

“I see,” he nodded thoughtfully, “So it’s your stomach’s fault.”

She nodded, “Yes.”

“I’ll have to speak to it later.”

Jules burst into another fit of laughter and it almost felt like nothing terrible had happened.

Then Vincenzo’s eyes found me, his smile became gentler, “I’m glad to see you out of that bedroom, piccolina.”

The nickname settled somewhere deep inside me. Mom used to smile whenever he called me that. He adjusted Killian with one arm and walked closer.

“How are you doing?”

I didn’t answer. He didn’t seem bothered by it, instead, he rested one hand lightly against the edge of the counter beside me.

“Do you need anything? Anything at all?” He asked and waited. When I still didn’t say a word, his eyes searched my face, “If you need to leave this house for a while, I’ll take you… for fresh air. You only have to ask.”