Loving The Temperamental Adonis
Chapter 245: Gunshot

Chapter 245: Gunshot

The sky was filled with countless stars that sparkled against the ebony night, with a crescent moon that reminded the girl standing at the window of her room of a half-moon cake given to her by her twin sister days ago. Her pink dress was still covered in mud from her crawl to the neighboring estate to get the puppy for the gray-eyed boy to whom she had promised it.

Her brown eyes glimmered with a loneliness that shouldn’t be found in the eyes of a girl her age. Her little mouth was set in a slight pout as she absentmindedly dug her nails into her palm, injuring herself but not feeling the pain after the housekeeper had scolded her upon her return. She didn’t know why, but she loved looking at the night sky because it always made her happy. But today, as she looked up at it, she couldn’t find that little happiness because she knew her twin sister was with the gray-eyed boy.

She wondered what they were doing and if he was still angry with her for taking the puppy. But as if on cue, she heard the door of her room bang open and heard footsteps approaching. The girl didn’t turn around to see who it was; her emotionless, lonely eyes remained on the sky. She didn’t move until she felt a small hand grab hers and swirl her around.

At first, when the girl saw that the person who had grabbed her was her twin sister, her brown eyes momentarily brightened. She knew her sister never failed to visit her at night with lots of chocolate and sweets she had hidden during the day. However, instead of the usual bright smile and a hand filled with chocolates, she was met with her twin sister’s angry face and darkened brown eyes. Sometimes it terrified her to see a face like hers in front of her, but she had come to get used to it after her sister did everything to make her feel less lonely and unwanted in the house.

"Mari, you came," said the girl. Despite trying to keep her face emotionless as usual, she couldn’t hide the little happiness she felt at the sight of her sister. But as she was about to reach out and pull her sister to their playroom so they could play before their father returned, the girl was surprised when Mariana moved away to avoid her touch and instead pushed her.

The girl fell to the floor, her backside hitting the ground with a little more force and causing her pain, but she had become so immune to such pain that she didn’t cry out. She didn’t even flinch and only stared at her twin sister in disbelief.

"Mari..." she whispered softly, her voice slightly shaking. Her sister had never hurt her or pushed her away. Though their father didn’t like her, her mother and sister loved her so much.

"Don’t call me that, you pig!" yelled Mariana as she glared down at her backstabbing sister who wanted to steal her best friend. "I thought we were friends and that you would never take what’s mine, but why did you go to Xavier and try to give him a puppy?"

Mariana had gone to play with her best friend when she saw him ignoring her and telling her to go home. She’d been so hurt by his actions until she realized he was angry because he believed she had been reckless by taking a puppy from its mother. She’d tried to explain that it wasn’t her, but he wouldn’t listen and scolded her. She’d known immediately that it was her sister he was talking about, and what made Mariana even angrier was the fact that, after a while, Xavier had told her that even though he liked her more for being daring, he didn’t want her to do that for him again.

He liked her sister more? No way. She was the one he knew, not her nameless sister, who she thought would never try to take her place. She’d felt threatened when he said that, and now she was here to set some boundaries.

"I wanted to give it to him because he deserves a new one. He loves dogs, and I will give him one every day," the girl murmured softly as she stared up at her twin from the floor. "Why are you angry, Mari? I didn’t take anything of yours; that boy is not yours."

Those words had gotten to Mariana so much that she didn’t care what would happen to her sister. She picked up her shoe and began to hit her with it while yelling like a little maniac. "How could you betray me after I gave you my chocolates and sweets?! I hate you. Father was right; you are a thief who will steal my mother and everything I love away from me! He warned me never to like you, and I should have listened!" She continued to hit her sister, who didn’t bother fighting back even though she’d gotten injured by the hits and was bleeding as a pin on the shoe grazed her skin.

Because the little girl’s room was so far away from the other rooms, nobody heard Mariana screaming in rage as she continued to hit her sister, who didn’t make a sound. A tear rolled down the little girl’s cheek. However, it wasn’t because of the pain from the hits but because of the pain in her heart, a pain that came from the realization that she’d lost her sister’s love as well. She didn’t know what it was, but her heart tightened, and she clenched her fists, not bothering to move away from the hits, believing perhaps her sister would feel good after hitting her.

Though the little girl wanted to tell her twin that she’d met Xavier first, she didn’t say it and closed her eyes. Mariana didn’t stop hitting her until she saw how she had injured her own hands in the process of her outburst. She moved back and glared at her bleeding sister with so much hate that shouldn’t have been there in the first place.

A satisfied smile graced her mouth as she saw how badly she had injured her twin. "If I ever catch you with Xavier, I will beat you with anything I find until you learn to stay away from my things. And don’t ever let me catch you singing our song!"

The little girl had been in pain the whole night, and when her mother came to kiss her goodnight, she saw the bruises on her body and asked who did this to her. Because she didn’t want to get her sister into trouble, she simply said, "I fell down when I was taking off my dress..."

That night, her mother had looked suspicious but had not said anything and helped her clean up and get into bed. The little girl knew she should not anger her sister anymore by seeking out the gray-eyed boy, but she couldn’t help it. She continued to practice the song he taught her sister, and whenever Mariana caught her playing the guitar, she’d drag her back into her room and give her the same beating as that night. It happened repeatedly, almost every night until the girl could no longer take it or keep lying to her mother about how she got the bruises on her body.

The sister she’d once loved now became the very thing she wanted to get rid of. The little girl could no longer take it anymore. She stopped sneaking out to see the gray-eyed boy, but it seemed her twin would never stop hurting her. From all that had happened lately, the little girl began to turn into something else.

One night, when her twin came into her room with a heel this time to cause her pain, the little girl was already waiting for her at the door. The moment Mariana entered, she whacked her in the head with a pan she’d taken from the kitchen earlier that day. Mariana passed out, and the little girl sat there staring at her unconscious body until their housekeeper, who was searching for Mariana, somehow came into the room.

The housekeeper panicked at first, but when she saw the pan in the little girl’s hand, she got so mad that she grabbed the girl and began to spank her on the backside while saying, "You have become so nasty these days. Your father has told me to beat you if you act stupid. Look what you did to your sister; you are a black seed, a curse to your family!"

Hearing the insult her father always used whenever he took her to those wicked people in white, the little girl felt fear and started to run for the door. But the housekeeper mistook her run for trying to escape punishment and went after her. The girl ran to the kitchen, trembling in fear as she believed they’d take her to the men again because of what she did to her sister. When she saw the housekeeper come after her, she instinctively grabbed a knife on the cabinet, and when the housekeeper tried to grab her, she used the knife impulsively to defend herself.

Everything happened so quickly, and before she knew it, the housekeeper had fallen to the floor, lying in a pool of her blood.

Hours later, when her father and mother returned home, the entire house was silent. The girl had been locked in her room as the other housekeepers feared she might harm another person. As she curled up in the corner of her room, rocking herself back and forth and whispering, "I am sorry, Mari. I am sorry, Miss Charlotte, I didn’t mean to."

The door to her room banged open, and her angry father strode in with a long whip. She could see how furious he was by the flush on his face, but she didn’t run to avoid him. When he came to grab her arm, she believed she had committed a crime and would be punished for it.

"You little devil, how dare you hit my baby? When I’m done with you today, you’ll fucking tell me where you learned to knock people out and stab them!" He roughly grabbed her by the collar, but her mother rushed in and stepped forward to pull her back from him.

"Let her go! She didn’t stab her on purpose; it was a mistake. You can’t punish her for a crime that was committed in the heat of the moment!"

"Stay away from this, Ella! This little devil needs to be taught a damned lesson!"

Her mother couldn’t stop her punishment that night, and when her father was done, she could barely leave her room the next day as her legs were swollen. She didn’t cry despite the pain, but when Mariana came in to taunt her, she forgot about her pain and acted impulsively again.

Mariana walked in to purposely show her the things Xavier had given her and also made fun of her by calling her, "Black seed. Father said you are a black seed from him, and that a black seed should never be allowed to be his child. Xavier promised to marry me when he grows older. Today, he swore to protect me and be my husband when we’ve come of age, and you will forever be dad’s black seed."

The little girl got so angry and swore to do the same thing she did to the housekeeper to her sister. She waited until the next day when her twin was being taken to a park by their nanny. She sneaked after them with a large nail in her pocket and hid in the back seat of the limo, remaining quiet. When they arrived at the park, she followed her sister around until she got an opportunity to attack.

She attacked her sister when their nanny wasn’t there, using her strength to keep her down. Despite her bruised body and swollen legs, the girl’s strength surprised Mariana who looked up at her emotionless face in horror. She pressed Mariana’s hand to the ground and used a big stone to nail her hand to the ground.

The girl watched her sister scream and bleed with a blank expression until the nanny rushed to them. This time, her next punishment was so severe that it left her broken forever. She was locked in a room without food or water, and then suddenly, one night, she heard screams in the house and the door opened and her mother rushed in.

"Oh, my dear. Let’s go. I’m taking you out of here. We have to leave before your father catches us!" She hurriedly grabbed the girl and began to pull her away. But as if remembering something, her mother stopped and said, "Stay right here, don’t move. I will go get something from my room." Then she left her alone.

However, the sound of a gunshot made her jump, and she hurried to follow the sound. There she found her father standing outside the house, holding a gun to a man’s head, a man she recognized as Xavier’s father. The gun went off in Mia’s head at the same time the gun in the warehouse resounded in her brain, and an agonizing scream tore out of her throat at the thought that Neil had been shot just like his father had been.

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A/N

Hi everyone!

I’m writing this to address those who have been requesting two Chapters a day. Each Chapter I upload is quite lengthy, with over 2,000 words. Currently, I’m going through a challenging time in my personal life, making it difficult to find the time to sit and write. Despite this, I still ensure that I keep uploading regularly.

I hope you understand, and I apologize for the long wait. Thank you for your patience and support.