Another Estella

EVA

I’d told them to hold off.

Damn it.

I’d warned them. I’d said Estella was fragile and they needed to tread lightly. But Julian, the man, was too eager.

I could see he was troubled, but what did he think would happen when he suddenly appeared in front of the poor girl?

He upset her, and Max practically threw them out. Who could blame him? I’d have done the same in his shoes.

Now the man was slumped on the office couch, elbows on his knees, hands running through his already messy hair. He’d been like that since they’d returned.

“Can I get you something to drink?” I offered, trying to be polite, even though I didn’t really feel sorry for him.

He just shook his head.

~“What went down?”~ I asked Patrick through our link.

He came over and took my hand in his.

“She thought he was her dad,” he replied the same way. “Apparently, the brothers looked a lot alike. When she realized Julian wasn’t her father, she lost it.”

“Oh, Goddess!”

“He didn’t even get a chance to talk to her, babe.”

“I told you to give Max more time,” I chided.

“It wasn’t about time. I didn’t know he looked like her dad. None of us did.”

Right on cue, the man started muttering to himself.

“It’s all my fault. Idiot. I should have known she’d get us confused...I messed up again.”

“You sure did,” a harsh voice said from the doorway.

We turned to see Max leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest, his face stern and angry.

MAX

I walked in on her uncle’s pathetic mumbling. No, I had no sympathy for the man who’d made Estella cry herself to sleep, her tiny body shaking in my arms.

I couldn’t soothe her or get her to speak to me at all.

He looked up at me with his red-rimmed eyes. “Is she okay?” he asked, sounding worried.

“What do you think?” I snapped back.

“Don’t mess with me, kid,” the man growled at me. “I feel guilty enough as it is.”

“I don’t care about your feelings. I only care about Estella, and if you think you’re taking her away from here, you’re dead wrong.”

“I’m her uncle, kid. I have every right to be her legal guardian. I’m her family,” he shouted, jumping up from his seat.

“Don’t ever call me kid again, old man,” I said icily. “You’re no family of hers if she doesn’t want you. You’re not fit to be anyone’s family.”

“How dare you?” he hissed.

“Me? Are you missing a few screws?” I taunted. I was beyond angry. “Your own brother, along with his family, burned to death while you were on a safari.

“The authorities tried to reach you for months, and you ignored them.

“Estella could have ended up anywhere. Hell, she could still be in the orphanage I rescued her from where she was being abused along with the other kids.

“And now you come in here and ask me how I dare to call you out? You’ve got some nerve!”

He stood there, pale as a ghost, glaring at me. I could tell he wanted to attack me, and I was hoping for it, just for the satisfaction of taking him down.

And it wasn’t even my wolf talking. He took a step forward, and I mirrored him. He was tall, but I was a bit taller.

“Max,” Patrick said in his alpha voice.

I whipped my head around to look at him.

“No,” he said again.

“Let’s just hear what Mr. Graham has to say,” Eva said in a calming voice.

~“Please, Max,”~ she pleaded through the link.

“Fine,” I said through clenched teeth. “Let’s hear him out.”

I took a step back, hating myself for backing down. But my alpha had given an order, and I had to follow it.

“Please, Mr. Graham, sit down,” my cousin said, addressing the man politely.

With a side glance at me, Estella’s uncle sat back down on the couch while Patrick took a seat behind his desk.

Eva and I took the armchairs in front of it, turning them to face the man.

“You understand, of course, that if you’d told us you look like Estella’s dad…,” Patrick started, but he was cut off.

“We don’t just look alike.” Julian sighed. “We were triplets.”

“Triplets?” I asked, surprised.

“Yes. James, Estella, and me. In that order. I know I should have told you. I was so overwhelmed by everything I didn’t think of it. I just wanted to see the girl so badly…”

“To see if she looked like your sister,” Eva finished for him.

“Yes,” he admitted. “I was so relieved that she took after her mother. She only has my brother’s eyes. James was the only one with brown eyes.

“We were all identical except for James’s eyes and Estella’s almost platinum-blonde hair.”

“Estella realized you weren’t her dad by your eyes,” I stated.

“Yes.”

“What happened to your sister?” I demanded.

Eva and Patrick gave me a disapproving look, clearly not liking my tone, but I just raised an eyebrow at them and focused on the man.

I vaguely remembered that the officer had said the sister died very early. I wanted to know. If it was his fault, I could use it against him.

The man narrowed his eyes at me.

“I don’t like your attitude,” he said, his face expressionless.

“Not many people do these days,” I replied with a smirk. “Do I look like the kind of guy who cares what others think?”

“What’s your name?”

He should know that already if he’d been paying attention.

“Answer my question, and I’ll answer yours.”

“If you weren’t out to get me, I might have liked you,” he said.

“If you hadn’t made my Estella cry, I might have liked you too.”

“Your Estella?” He laughed.

“Yes, mine. I was there when you weren’t. So were Eva, Patrick, my parents… even the social worker who visits once a week has a stronger claim to her than you do.

“Now, what happened to your sister?”

“She died,” he said, his voice flat.

“We know that. How?”

“That’s none of your business.”

“Did she die under your protection?” I asked.

The look of shock and guilt on his face confirmed my suspicion. I’d only meant to rile him up, but… shit.

He hung his head and took a deep breath. Then he started talking.

“The three of us were always close. It didn’t matter that Estella was a girl. We saw her as our equal because she was. Our parents taught us not to discriminate.

“She protected us just as much as we protected her. Maybe even more. She was smart, beautiful, and brave. We had a special bond.

“We could feel each other’s smallest emotions, every mood shift… This was stronger when we were kids, but as we grew up, we learned to tell when one of us really needed the others.

“We managed to be close but independent. We were never apart. We had different friends, sure, but we always looked out for each other.

“We even went to the same university, studying different things, and lived together in an apartment.”

He paused, rubbing his forehead with a shaking hand.

“James and I were more carefree, being boys and all, but Estella was the romantic one.

“My brother had a crush on Liz, my niece’s mom, but he was too scared to tell her…

“I was between girlfriends, but Estella was dating someone. Dominic Sanders.”

He practically spat out the guy’s name. I furrowed my brows but didn’t say anything. I wanted to see where this was going.

“We didn’t like him much and told her so. There wasn’t anything specific. He seemed nice and polite, but something about him felt off.

“Estella told us to back off, and we did because we trusted her. Plus, she seemed in love, and we didn’t want to ruin that for her.

“But, six months into the relationship, we could tell she was unhappy. For the first time, she didn’t confide in us, and we got suspicious.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Eva leave the room, and I missed part of what he said next.

“…bruises. But there weren’t any.”

When Eva came back and offered him a glass of water, he looked up at her and thanked her before taking a sip. Then he continued his story.

“To cut a long story short, Dominic pressured our sister to have sex with him.

“Estella wasn’t ready, and after a couple of months, she couldn’t take it anymore and broke up with him.

“We all said good riddance and tried to cheer her up, but it didn’t work. It was her first heartbreak, and she was going through it hard. No sleep, barely eating, and staying in.

“We learned to give her space. One night, there was a bonfire. We tried to get her to come, but she didn’t want to because she knew Dominic would be there.

“James tried to convince her, but I didn’t want to pressure her. She said she might go for a late-night jog like she used to.

“The area was safe. Lots of students did the same. We left. Dominic and his friends weren’t at the bonfire, so James suggested he should go get Estella.

“I stopped him, thinking Dominic might show up later. After that, we just tried to have a good time. We drank a lot and messed around.

“I was in the middle of making out with someone when James interrupted, saying he felt weird and we should check on Estella.

“I’d felt it too but brushed it off as a false alarm.”

Julian paused again, his face full of pain. His breathing was ragged. It was clear where his story was headed. The alarm wasn’t false.

For the first time, I felt a bit of sympathy for the guy. Don’t get me wrong. I was still pissed, but… no one should have to go through… that.

“I tried to calm James down until I saw Dominic and his friends. Something was off about them.

“They were trying to fit in awkwardly, and Dominic had half-hidden scratches on his neck. I stopped arguing with James, and we ran to find her.”

His face darkened, and tears welled up in his eyes.

“We… we were… too… fucking… late. The… the ambulance was… already there, taking her away. I’ll never forget all the… blood.

“She was… she was barely recognizable. She died on the way to the hospital.”

“Did they at least catch them?” Patrick asked from behind me, his voice slightly hoarse from staying quiet for so long.

Julian nodded, trying to pull himself together.

“When the police asked, I told them what I’d seen at the bonfire. Since the assault was done by multiple people, they arrested all four of them.”

“Did they confess?”

“Yes, and from what we were told, they were proud of it. They said if she hadn’t gone out that night, they would have broken into our apartment to do it.”

“Bastards,” I muttered under my breath, and Julian gave me a look I couldn’t read.

“The minute we laid her to rest, James started pointing fingers at me,” he confessed. “I told him he had a choice, that he was just as much to blame as I was.”

“You’re kidding,” I retorted.

“I didn’t mean it. I was just trying to protect myself. I was already hurting enough. The guilt just kept piling up. We stopped talking after that.

“We left our shared apartment and lived apart for the first time in two decades. Two years later, our mom passed away from leukemia.

“Right after I graduated, I got a job offer in Australia. I took it without hesitation. When our dad died six years later, I didn’t even come back.

“I stayed put, and I was doing well.

“I became a partner at the company I was working for and ended up owning most of it when the original owner, a werewolf, decided to sell it to me.

“Later, I bought four more companies. That’s how I met your dad, Patrick. I was looking to invest here too, and he helped me out.

“I married Lydia, and not long after, I started getting letters from Liz. I have no idea how she found me, and I never asked.

“She told me she and James were married, and she wrote to me twice a year, even though I never wrote back.

“When their kids were born, she sent me photos. Six years ago, she sent me a picture of Estella, and I lost it.

“I wrote her a furious letter, demanding she change the child’s name and never contact me again. She did the latter, at least.”

He sighed and leaned back on the couch.

“I was never worried about my brother. I thought that even if something happened to Estella, I would know if something bad happened to him.

“But I didn’t feel anything the day of the accident. Nothing. So, I thought whatever they wanted from me could wait.

“Lydia had been pestering me for days when I finally told her, but I didn’t mind her.”

“You seem to have a habit of ignoring people,” I remarked sarcastically.

“Seems like it.” He laughed bitterly. “But you’re not so different from me, are you, Max?”

His comment hurt more than the realization that he’d known my name all along.

“I’m nothing like you,” I said, my face expressionless.

“Tell me that when you mess up. Because, as you said earlier, you don’t seem like the type who cares what others think.” He chuckled, and I was inches away from punching him.

“Anyway,” he continued, “when Brian and Valerie came to visit and started talking about the girl their son and nephew found, and how she had the same name as my dead sister, I got upset and asked for her last name.

“Your dad called you, and I finally called the authorities. It took me two days to gather my courage and fly here.”

“And thinking only of yourself, you stormed into my home and started calling her,” I growled.

“Before I had time to prepare her and before you even thought to tell us you looked just like her dad.”

“You had two days to prepare her for my arrival,” he accused.

“No, I didn’t...,” I retorted, and then I stopped, turning to look at Patrick, who was avoiding my gaze.

He knew.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured.

“You’re sorry. You’re just as much to blame as he is for what happened today,” I yelled.

“Max, he didn’t know how to tell you.” Eva defended her mate.

“Really? One simple sentence, Eva, ‘Estella’s uncle is coming to take her.’ That’s all. You could have told me yesterday, Patrick, instead of waiting until the last minute.”

~“She’s your mate,”~ he said through the link. ~“I was trying to find an easy way.”~

~“There is no easy way, and this is bigger than the mate thing. It’s about her life, her future,”~ I yelled through the link and shut him out.

“What’s done is done,” Julian said.

“Easy for you to say,” I snapped. “You weren’t the one who had to calm her down.”

“I was the one who upset her. I get it, so stop attacking me. I can’t change that, and neither can you. You care about my niece, so tell me how I can make it right.”

“Go back to where you came from.”

“Not without Estella. Even if I didn’t want to take her, Lydia would kill me if I didn’t do right by my family.”

I hate to admit it, but I saw sincerity in his eyes. He wanted to do the right thing, and I had to do the same. Not for her. For Estella. She needed to be with her family. Her blood family.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. This wasn’t the time to be selfish.

“Give me a few days to talk to her, to explain everything. Don’t show your face here until I call you to tell you she’s ready,” I said firmly.