Chapter 2.13: Battle Of The Siblings

After Yeonhee cleaned up the broken mirror, the heiress could get ready for the day. Alek had mentioned wanting to train as soon as the day started, so she hurried to put herself together. From what she could from her window, the older man was already waiting for her. Leila was hopeful that they could go easy today. She didn't want to risk anything. With these new powers, she had unleashed the teenager, worried she could harm him. Or worse, from using it, her energy would deplete faster than usual and she'd fight like a child. Either scenario irritated her with their probability. But Leila couldn't back out. The training was necessary. Especially with you-know-who possibly being by every corner.

"Sister, we need to talk." Think of the devil and he shall appear is what the assassin thought. Cale's large build stopped her from leaving her bedroom.

He looked calm, which meant he wanted to say something that may or may not be sickening for a human being to hear. The heiress crossed her arms over her chest and looked up into his eyes. She wanted to make it very clear the pig didn't scare her despite her dizziness. Breaking the mirror had knocked her off her balance, and she knew that he could tell something was off. Which drove the jade-eyed teenager mad as he smiled. Leila could only imagine that he got to Liliko'i after the two women spoke and became enraged. The bastard now had to worry about his dreaded snake little sister playing in his wife's head. In her eyes, it was only fair game with his entire presence. Still, the two faced off with boiling animosity.

Cale put a hand on the wall right above her head and leaned downward, getting in her face. His top lip trembled, showing some of that incoming temper tantrum before he controlled himself. The heiress hated that someone so boorish dared to step on her. It showed the lack of respect he had for her, his sister. If so much wasn't at stake, she would pop the bastard right there. Sometimes the teenager felt like she had become a ticking time bomb. With one moment of losing control, she could take over anyone. Cleo's brother had no idea who he was dealing with here. If she was as cocky as he loved to claim, she would go straight for his meaty head. But Leila knew better and instead stared back with a cheerful expression that grated on the older man's nerves.

"Lili is frazzled by the conversation you had with her. Mind telling me what you two talked about?"

Leila frowned and shrugged her shoulders in a display of confusion at his words. "Liliko'i didn't tell you?"

The visible irritation on his face satisfied the woman when he responded. "She refused to." The heiress could tell that rarely happened and drove the man insane.

Because he had found a young girl to raise into becoming a dutiful wife. Liliko'i was as loyal to her brother as any wife would be to her husband. But one private encounter with his hated sister changed that loyalty. It caused the image the woman had of him to change somewhat. As Leila was sure that Cale had painted her out to be cold and heartless. Someone who would have left the younger blonde at the bottom of the stairs without a shred of guilt. Instead, the dark-haired woman extended her hand and helped the girl out. Which disrupted the image that Cale had painted, leaving her distrust to start to bloom. Leaving her unable to answer the man's demands with the same blind devotion she had before.

That dug into him deep. And Leila was taking that insignificant victory to the grave. Because now the ball was in her court and she wasn't going to pass it back. If Cale forced Liliko'i not to meet with her the next day, the blonde would be suspicious. When the two women were alone again, the heiress could easily paint a story about her brother being a liar and use that as proof. And if he let her go, the jade-eyed teenager planned to suck the country girl dry. Every insecurity, every piece of her past would be absorbed into the teenager's memory. So when the time was right, she could use it against Cale with a smile on her face, playing innocent and the sweet sister-in-law role. Something that the servants could believe without a doubt about the mask she wore. Cale might have some of them bewitched, but eventually, someone or something would let his temper loose.

"Ah, well, maybe it's because she feared you'd scold her for being injured. Lili became nauseous, and she lost her balance, falling right as I entered the hall. You should be watching her more closely. Her pregnancy seems difficult." Leila knew it was for the best to leave Elissa out of the explanation. Cale would torment the poor maid.

"I watch my wife perfectly fine." This made the younger woman giggle, a hand covering her mouth. "What's funny, Cleo? Now's not the time to act like a brat. It could have hurt my child."

She rolled her eyes. He was being overdramatic. But there was no point in riling him up for him to go take it on the poor girl. So the heiress hummed, playing with a strand of her hair as she responded.

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"Your child is fine because of me, so don't get your panties in a twist when I give advice. She's scared out of her literal mind because you threw her into this world unprepared. Like a dumbass. Do you know the number of anxiety attacks she's had since that dinner with our mother?" Leila raised an eyebrow at that last part, leaning up against his chest.

They both knew that what he did was reckless. He had met a girl who grew up collecting fruit from trees, protected from war and famine by her family. With a starry-eyed look, he swept her up into his arms and took her away to a world of crime, bloodshed, and pain. A life that would be a living nightmare for someone who lived such a sheltered life with a loving childhood. It was sickening to throw her into such a dangerous life without any warning or form of protection. Leila debates if he did it purposely, a show of power to make it clear she could never live without him. Or if it was just something he never thought about that hard. Because he was so focused on his issues. Whatever his reasoning was, it ended in disaster.

"Step back, Cleo." His tone was bitter enough to scare anyone besides a trained killer into silence. "Move away from me."

A sigh left her lips, which were tinted pink from lip paint, and her tired eyes rolled once more. Her body stayed in place, but she became less tense than before. To the point that she seemed more than unbothered, but oblivious to what the threat was being made. Not that it was the truth. In actuality, Leila was swimming in uncertainty about whether she could control her powers if they fought. This thick wave of discomfort bombed beneath the surface as she poked the man's chest with her nail. Doing so made his cheek twitch, a telltale sign that Cleo's brother was struggling not to punch her. His green eyes had filled with a murky color that made her stomach turn sour. This all showed her that the bastard truly was as charming and calculating as the author's notes written out. Leila needed to dial it down a bit.

She took a half step back and leaned against her door frame. "Calm down before you blow a gasket. You should know pregnancy and marriage is a sensitive topic to me. I can't just hold my tongue when you're sabotaging both before my eyes."

"I'm not sabotaging anything–" His voice caught in his throat when she held a hand up and glared heatedly.

The words she proceeded to speak rolled off her tongue like honey, the tone just as sickeningly sweet. "Yes, you are. You brought a fawn into a den of wolves. Any man who cared about his lover wouldn't force them to meet their narcissistic mother." Leila shocked them both by speaking ill of her public.

It was not like her to do so. But this entire conversation was out of the ordinary now that the teenager thought about it. She wasn't sure if Cleo would have ever spoken this way to the man. In her darkest moment, she begged him for help, so the love and admiration were there. Which made Leila feel dizzy, with emotions conflicting in nature to sit and acknowledge right now. Instead of dwelling on what the deceased assassin would have done, she focused on how her actions affected the game. Because now Cale saw her completely differently. The man must be lost in the image he was being presented with in person. An image that contrasted heavily with the sobbing sister who wrote to him months prior. Letters of which the heiress knew he laughed about, along with the twins. The knowledge of this boiled her from the inside out with its negativity.

"I never thought you'd say something so sick of our mother. You've always been her favorite." His words rang true to the teenager's ears, who deflated.

"I'm well aware of her fixation with me and how it's caused me to get a slap on the hand often. I don't think I'd have said that before my engagement. But I was nearly a wife, mother, and heir. Now I see her actions as one rather differently than before." She muttered as some maids walked by, chatting amongst themselves.

Once they left around the corridor, the dark-haired heiress continued. Her voice became stern. "Liliko'i can't break free of mother's manipulations like I did. She's too sweet and naïve. Leave with her as soon as your honeymoon is ready to go. Never come back. That way, she and your child will be safe."

'If he refuses, mother's approval and the power of having the first grandchild matters more than Lili.' The thought sat heavily within her already convoluted mind as the afternoon sky turned a new shade. They had been talking for longer than she expected.

A hand grabbed her top and yanked it down, revealing her nearly naked chest. It slipped down, revealing most of her now naked chest to the man. He pulled her upward in a fit of disbelief. "You think my child will be safer climbing trees? Sleeping in humidity that would make your skin a golden tan?"

"No," Cale opened his mouth after she responded, but could not retort as she kept going. "Don't you think your child will be happier atop a tree, tanned, looking for fruit, than a target to slaughter?"

Leila wasn't sure what she expected after that. Maybe for the taller man to huff and puff before storming off. Or to get into a screaming match at her till spit was all over her face with his eyes bulging out above. The girl was in a part of the world that left her truly unsure of what may happen next. But Cleo always knew. The assassin's body could sense a threat. The teen managed to push herself out of Cale's grasp right as a nasty right hook missed her face. From the force, she would have been bloody. This sent her into an adrenaline overdrive. Quickly, she slammed her bedroom door so fast she almost hit herself in a hurry. And then she bolted it shut with every lock that it had.