LUCIEN’S POV
The water was still, the air thick with the scent of chlorine. I leaned against the edge of the pool, my head tilted back, eyes closed, letting the silence wrap around me.
It had been this way since dawn.
I had woken up feeling… heavy. The weight of three days ago, of him pressing against my chest like a stone.
My younger brother.
I had seen him.
For years, I had buried that part of my life, convinced myself that whatever had been left of my human past had long withered away. But that image of three days ago in the woods had proven that fate had once again ripped open my broken heart again like an unhealed wound.
Did my parents ever see me in his eyes?
Did they ever look at him and wonder if I was still out there, alive, breathing?
Or had they given up?
Had they
