Before you read this chapter, please note that it may be triggering to some and I urge you to please skip it or leave the entire book if it triggers you. And remember that my DM's are always open if you ever want to talk.

Iris POV

Walking into the unfamiliar mansion, I trail behind my parents. My mother, to her credit has not forgotten the layout of the mansion and she walks confidently next to my father who seems more than a little bit nervous, however, the second we enter the lounge, all signs of nervousness are masked with faux confidence.

I scan the faces of the people sitting on the sofas, they're my brothers, I know that much but in regards to which one is which, I have no clue.

Suddenly, my nerves overtake me and I barely register the words spoken between my father and one of my brothers before suddenly, a man runs toward me and wraps his arms around me.

For a second, I panic, I didn't know this man but then I feel a sense of familiarity if that makes any sense, and despite my mind screaming at me not to, I find myself relaxing in his warm embrace.

Strangely enough, I don't feel uncomfortable in this man - my brothers - arms, and the thought alone scares me, but I brush it off.

"Welcome home, la Mia luce." The man says, the nickname warms my heart and I find myself smiling into his chest. My arms wrap tightly around him, and just like that I know that this man is someone that I can trust.

Sure it may seem like I'm trusting him too soon, but there's something about this brother of mine that makes it seem as though he would rather die than hurt me, and my brain acknowledges that fact enough to trust him.

A few moments later, he reluctantly pulls away from the hug and looks me over as if to see if I'm real before he walks over to our parents to give mama a short hug before he stands next to dad.

The rest of the boys simply stare at us, and I feel more than a little weird so I quickly find my way to the man and hold his hand.

Somehow, I trust him more than I trust my father, and a part of me knows that even though it might hurt my father's feelings, I don't care enough to change that. He's done nothing to make me trust him but at the same time, he hasn't done anything to make me distrust him.

In the next few minutes, I'm introduced to the rest of my brothers, and I realise that Leandro is probably going to be my favourite and that I'll be sticking to him like glue until I'm comfortable with the rest of my brothers. Right now, he seems like comfort to me and even though it's a strange feeling, I welcome it and so, I welcome him.

Once everyone is acquainted with one another, it goes dead silent. I don't think any of us really knows what to say right now. I always knew this was coming, it was inevitable, but I imagined it would be a lost less awkward than it is right now.

"C'mon, La mia luce, I'll show you to your room." Leo says, I think he's pretty tired of the awkwardness too. The silence was pretty damned suffocating in there.

I nod and he immediately takes my hand in his once again before leading the way to my apparent room. Despite myself, I can't help but feel happy to finally have my own room. At this point, I don't really care about the way it looks because I'll take pretty much anything.

"Rocco and I decorate it every three years. Him because he loves doing that type of stuff and me because someone had to be there to tell him no when he wanted to have neon yellow bedsheets, and also because we all thought that I'd know what you would like more than the rest of them would." Leo tells me, he seems nervous about me seeing the room, almost as if he's scared that I won't like it.

"Don't worry, Leo. I'm sure I'll love it. And thank you for making the effort to decorate it." I tell him, watching his shoulders sag in relief.

A few seconds later, we're standing outside a door that has my name written on it in silver calligraphy. It's so beautiful, I almost doubt that it's mine before I realise that it literally says my name on it so I don't know who the hell else it would belong to.

"And here we are." Leo says, his voice holding an undertone of nervousness as he opens the door for me and let's me walk in.

My jaw almost drops at how absolutely perfect the room is, somehow, Leo and Rocco managed to create the perfect balance of eccentric and minimalistic to make the most perfect room to have ever existed.

Stop exaggerating.

I'll do what I want, leave me alone.

No.

Yes.

No.

Ugh, just shut up. You're my mind. You're supposed to be on my side. What the hell.

With that, the thoughts in my mind stop because I think my brain also realises how much of an important part of my life this is. I've never had a room before, and my heart feels like it might just explode from happiness. I can't handle it, and I feel like words aren't enough to convey my gratitude, so I just throw my arms around my brothers large frame and hope that he understands what I'm trying to say with the hug.

When we pull away, there's a smile on his face, but before either of us say anything more, his phone suddenly rings and a there's a flicker of anger in his eyes when he looks at the caller ID, but it's gone so suddenly that I think there's a chance I may have imagined it.

"I'm sorry, Iris, I have to go to work real quick, but I'll be back later. You can look around the house or have a nap or something in the meantime." Leo says before rushing away before I have the chance to respond.

With that, I shut the room door, finally alone with my thoughts. I take a few minutes to wonder around the room and go through everything, and I discover that I have my very own bathroom as well, it's all so beautiful that I can't help but think that I'm not worthy of it all.

Suddenly, looking around the room makes me feel nothing more than disgust because someone as damaged as I am doesn't deserve anything close to this.

I'm damaged, broken, unable to trust or even communicate with many people at a time, what the heck am I going to dk with such nice stuff? I should probably talk with someone about giving everything away to someone who truly deserves it, because there's no doubt in my mind when I say that I'm not even remotely close to deserving any of it.

Sure I may be comfortable with Leo right now, but who's to say that he won't do something to break my trust? Who's to say that I can even trust him in the first place?

Thoughts of doubt creep into my mind, and suddenly it's not even about my brothers anymore, all that I can feel and see is Antione.

I can hear him telling me that I shouldn't be here, I can hear him reminding me about how worthless I am, I can hear it all.

And just like that, all the happy memories that occurred in the past two days vanish and I'm back to being this shell of a person who's worth nothing, I'm back to feeling almost nothing and I can't decide if that's something that I like or hate, but it makes most of my feelings go away and I think that in the end, that's all that matters.

I was a fool to think that having my family back would mean that everything would be just fine, a fool for thinking that my family would make it all go away, and a fool for thinking that I ever deserved anything better than what Antione ever gave me.

Tears suddenly fall out of my eyes, half snapping me out of my thoughts, except it isn't enough and I'm plunged into a memory of mine, it was on one of my birthdays but it feels so long ago that I no longer remember which birthday it was. All that I know is that I was a child who just wanted to be normal.

My tutors had told me about birthday parties and I begged Antoine for one, just wanting to pretend to be normal. He normally obliged to my birthday wish, but I'd since learned to regret that he ever listened to this one.

Recalling the memory fills me with an icy rage that manages to pull me out of my faze for long enough that I make my way to the bathroom, and splash water on my face.

I won't let Antoine win, not yet, not when I still have time to carry out my revenge. Until then, I refuse to let him win, I won't give him the satisfaction of knowing that it was him who broke me, so instead I look at myself in the mirror and almost scoff at the weak girl that I see.

I won't let myself be a victim, never again.

I was a child who never learnt to defend herself, but that child is dead and I'm here in her place with a family that would be willing to help me learn what to do in case someone ever tried to do to me what Antoine did.

I am now a young woman who won't let her abusers win, even if it means that I'll die after getting my revenge, because at this point, revenge is the only thing keeping me alive.

I have nothing to lose except my life, and I intend to lose it all for the sake of winning because my mother always says that she never raised a loser.

Maybe in the process of it all, I'll finally prove my worth to my mother who missed her sons too much to bother about the daughter who suffered with her.

Maybe now was my time to shine before I burnt out, its time I live just a little bit before I go out like just another star in the multiverse.

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Slightly longer chapter, I apologise for the crappiness but school had my brain working on nothing.

I'm trying to make it better but I just came up with another storyline that I love, so there's a lot of foreshadowing in this chapter 💀

It's literally the only reason that this was written, because I finally had another idea and I'm motivated enough to follow through with it.

But yeah, I'm sorry for the late update too, I'm trying but I'm exhausted, I should just unpublish atp.

But we shall see ig, I'm gonna try for even longer chapters after this, but this was all the motivation that I had for now, and I figure that I haven't updated in literally 15 days now soooooo.....