Fractured Darkness Read online

  Fractured Darkness

  Ally Vance

  Contents

  TRIGGER WARNING

  Shine

  1. Jace

  2. Mica

  3. Jace

  4. Mica

  5. Jace

  6. Mica

  7. Caleb

  8. Jace

  9. Mica

  10. Jace

  11. Mica

  12. Jace

  13. Mica

  14. Jace

  15. Caleb

  16. Mica

  17. Jace

  18. Mica

  19. Jace

  20. Caleb

  21. Jace

  22. Mica

  23. Jace

  24. Mica

  25. Jace

  26. Mica

  27. Jace

  28. Mica

  29. Jace

  30. Mica

  31. Jace

  32. Mica

  33. Jace

  34. Mica

  35. Jace

  36. Mica

  37. Jace

  38. Mica

  39. Jace

  40. Mica

  41. Jace

  42. Mica

  43. Caleb

  44. Jace

  45. Mica

  46. Jace

  47. Mica

  48. Caleb

  49. Mica

  50. Jace

  51. Mica

  52. Jace

  53. Mica

  54. Jace

  55. Mica

  56. Jace

  57. Caleb

  58. Mica

  59. Jace

  60. Mica

  61. Jace

  62. Mica

  63. Jace

  Epilogue

  Helpful Contacts

  Playlist

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Other Books By Ally Vance

  Books By Ally Michelle

  Copyright © 2018 by Ally Vance

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems without written permission from the author, except for the brief use of quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is completely coincidental.

  Cover Design: Pretty In Ink Creations

  Formatting: Pretty In Ink Creations

  Cover Photo: Depositphotos

  Editor: Sheena Taylor

  To all the broken & lost souls.

  Never give up, because there is always hope.

  TRIGGER WARNING

  Due to graphic scenes of abuse, this is not suitable for readers under 18 or sensitive to abuse issues.

  Shine

  Hold onto the memories,

  Don't let them grip you in their chains.

  You're more than your past,

  You're more than your pain.

  Breathe through the darkness,

  Until you find the light.

  Don't relinquish your power,

  Don't let the hurt drag you down.

  There is light after darkness,

  There is love after hate.

  Never give up the fight,

  Never let the monsters win.

  Your scars are part of who you are,

  They show you had the strength to carry on.

  Wear them proudly with your head held high,

  Because in the darkness you will shine.

  1

  Jace

  My brother brought his new girlfriend home today, and I could barely speak when I saw her. I swear my heart stopped dead in my chest, and I couldn’t breathe. She was breathtaking, and I was so stunned I could barely string together more than a mumbled, “Hi, nice to meet you.”

  I retreat to my room after that fumble and lie on my bed with my headphones in because I don't want to hear them together. Caleb's bedroom is right next to mine, so I can always hear every word and sound, and it fucking sucks. I hate living here with him, but since my dad and grandparents died and Mom left, I have no other family to turn to for help. I don't want to be here, but I have nowhere else to go. I already know he won't let me leave anyway; he drags me back here every time I try to get away, so what's the fucking point in even thinking about leaving. So I stay.

  I wake each day in absolute terror because I never know how he's going to be from one day to the next. My big brother is fucking broken inside, and there is nothing I can do to make it better. You can’t fill an empty soul with love and life. At least I didn’t think so, but lately he seems better. He acts more human, more likely to make jokes and laugh rather than roaring and shouting all the time, and I wonder if it’s because of her, Mica.

  Mica...there is light inside of her, an aura of innocence but there is also a hint of darkness tucked away, a pain in her eyes that's just out of reach. It sends a need through me to pull her close and hold her tightly to me. I don’t dare, though. My brother is fucking unpredictable, and I can tell he sees Mica as his. I might be his brother...his blood, but I think he would kill me if I dared to touch her. So, I keep my distance; it's safer for me that way and for her...

  One Year Later...

  It’s been nearly a year since Caleb last had an incident, and things have been good between us, or at least better than they used to be. He hasn’t had so many of the violent outbursts where he loses all sense and turns into a fucking monster since he started dating her. Yesterday he told me Mica will be coming to live with us, and my stomach damn near dropped out of my ass. The thought of being around her so much fills me with equal parts joy and dread. I want her here, but I also want her here with me and not him.

  A part of me suspects he knows how I feel about her although I’ve been careful to hide it. When she's around, I'm polite but work to keep myself distant. However, I can’t help following her movements with my eyes as she wanders around our house. It feels wrong we’re all going to be under one roof, and I know my brother: he may seem better lately, but it feels like the calm right before the storm.

  2

  Mica

  I'm happier than I’ve felt in a long time, and I know it's because of him. Caleb makes me feel special, beautiful, and he gives me everything I need. For the first time in what seems like forever, I feel alive. I've felt alone for so long, living with my Aunt Sarah in her way-too-small house. It's just the two of us, but we’ve been little more than strangers to each other. She’s never tried to get close to me. I think she resents the fact her brother didn't survive the car crash, while I was safely in school. That was four years ago, and things haven't gotten any better between us, remaining stagnant and hollow.

  A soft knock at the door draws Mr. Landon’s attention from teaching. The school receptionist enters the room and says something to him no one can hear. As he nods, the receptionist moves to the door and steps outside the room.

  “Miss Kiernan, pack away your books and go to the office, please.”

  I get up, and grabbing my bag, I silently leaving the classroom, ignoring the whispers following behind me.

  I assume Mom has booked me in with the dentist, or for a doctor’s appointment, or something similar. What I don’t expect, is to see my dad’s sister, Aunt Sarah, sitting in the office sobbing with tears streaming down her face.

  Aunt Sarah turns to me, and with all of her despair and anger directed at me, she chokes out bluntly, “Your parents were involved in a car crash this morning...a head-on collision with a truck. They died instantly.”

  I black out.

  I feel like I'm drifting, floating away
to sea in a boat with a hole in the bottom. Slowly the water seeps in, and I'm drowning but can't find the will to swim. It's been weeks...months since the accident, and I came to live with Aunt Sarah. Things haven't gotten any better: we hate each other at worst and tolerate at best. I’m the responsibility she never wanted to have, and I know she resents the fact I’m alive, and a constant reminder of the brother she lost.

  I've been on autopilot since the accident. It's as if I've left the building...Mica is here, but her soul is no longer home. The other day my hand slipped while shaving my legs, and I sliced the skin open. It was a pretty deep cut, enough for me to need to put on a small bandage. The bite and sting, though, sent a sensation through me I thought I’d lost...pain.

  It’s all I can think about, being able to feel something again. Focusing my pain and releasing it, red tears fall from the cuts on my thighs. Tears I can’t seem to shed any other way than with a steely touch.

  After a while, I find the ability to cry again. I weep out the gut-wrenching pain that twists my heart in its icy grip. But by then it’s too late as silver and red webs decorate my thighs in a macabre tattoo I know will never fade. Now I’m able to feel, and I’m unable to control this need to keep on adding more. Will this craving...these urges ever stop?

  Loneliness is all consuming. I didn't connect with people my own age at school because they made fun of me, picking up on the fact I couldn't seem to fit in anywhere. I was the quiet girl who wouldn't talk, who kept her head down in class, and who focused on her studies. What they didn't know...what my Aunt didn't know was...I was screaming inside. The pain and everything else I kept bottled up eventually clawed its way out and onto my skin. I couldn't keep it locked away anymore.

  Caleb muffles the screaming inside me that the cutting no longer helps with; he brings out a light in me I thought had died long ago. There is something different about him, and I feel like maybe he gets that about me too. Things have been picking up between us and getting to be more serious. He even took me to his house the other day, but it was strange...he acted a little off although maybe he was just nervous because his brother, Jace, was there. Jace made me feel a little uneasy because I sensed he could see into the depths of me, and the secrets I keep hidden inside. I gave myself to Caleb for the first time the next day, at home in my bed, and it was like being whole once again.

  One Year Later...

  My aunt kicked me out this morning, having found Caleb and me in bed together the night before. She threw Caleb out and then spent nearly an hour screaming at me, calling me a slut and a whore before telling me to get out of her house. It didn't matter in her mind Caleb and I have been together for a year, and I'm now twenty years old. I think she just wanted an excuse to finally be rid of me.

  Which is why I now find myself on Caleb’s doorstep with a suitcase, two boxes, and tears streaming down my face. When he answers the door, he doesn’t say a word, he merely draws me into his arms and lets me cry it all out, reassuring me everything will be okay. He tells me I can move in with him and Jace. It’s sooner than he expected, but he intended for me to do so eventually.

  3

  Jace

  It's been a month since Mica came to live with us, and it's been strange having her here all the time. I feel like I'm forever stepping on eggshells, trying not to crack them under my feet in my attempt to remain distant, but it's painfully difficult. Mica is an undeniable presence in our house, and it's getting harder and harder to ignore her. I often catch her watching me with a sad and confused look on her face, probably wondering why I'm behaving this way. I suspect Caleb sees how I feel, the thinly veiled want I’m barely able to conceal. Mica’s ignorance is what's keeping this whole situation calm, but we’re on the precipice. If she ever finds out how I really feel, then we’re both fucking screwed.

  How do you tell your brother’s girlfriend it’s not her who's the problem, it’s you? That is a can of damn worms I can’t and won’t fucking open. Caleb is watching me like a hawk all the time, waiting for me to slip. I can see it there, simmering under the surface like a pot about to boil over. All hell will break loose if I ever falter, and it’s best for us all I don’t let that happen.

  Every night she goes to my brother's room with him, and every night I stare at the wall separating us, wishing she was in here with me instead. The sounds that come from their room are absolute torture to my heart, and I want to pour acid in my ears, so I don't have to hear the two of them together. Every night, over and over, his harsh grunts, and her soft moans and screams as he fucks her. Sleeping with a pillow over my head doesn't muffle the sounds, and I can never get to sleep until long after they have finished. Not until their noises stop reverberating around my skull, burning my insides with jealousy.

  Disgust sits in my throat as I jerk off to release some of the tension I feel, soothing the ache burning through me. The way her soft curves hide under her clothing, and her long dark brown hair, which falls in waves down her back and in front of her stunning blue eyes. Eyes that don’t manage to hide the demons lurking in their depths. I want her...I want her beneath me every night. I want to steal kisses from her lips, and then have those same lips wrapped around my cock.

  I come hard with her name on the tip of my tongue, just managing to not call it out for all to hear. After I stop panting and my heartbeat slows, I put my hands over my face and groan. I'm so fucked. Caleb is going to slaughter my ass if he finds out.

  4

  Mica

  Jace is so confusing, and I can’t figure out what his problem seems to be with me. I don’t really care either way as I’m with Caleb and not him, but it feels awkward when it’s just Jace and me in a room together. The tension is almost tangible and hangs like smog, filling my lungs and making it hard to breathe.

  I've been living here for nearly two months, and it hasn't gotten any easier between us, and now things have started to get a little strange with Caleb. He's becoming more distant and moody. I've put it down to the stress of having me here with the three of us being in such close quarters. It's not a small house by any means: it has two bedrooms, a living room, a large kitchen-diner, and two bathrooms. But even with all that space, sometimes it feels like I'm suffocating.

  Caleb is staying out longer each day that goes by, and I'm feeling more alone as time passes. He didn't come home again last night, so once more I woke up in our bed alone. I've fallen back into old habits. I could barely cope with it at my Aunt Sarah's, but I never thought I'd have to deal with it here. Caleb’s always balanced me out and given me the ability to breathe, never taken it from me. I know it pisses him off. Whenever he sees the results of my coping strategy, his jaw hardens and ticks, and his eyes blacken with anger. It fucking scares me, but I can't stop. The urge to self-harm doesn’t fade, even with him.

  Our lovemaking has been rougher lately, more brutal, almost violent, and it feels more like fucking than making love. I can't deny I love it though: the raw and vicious way we intimately come together these days. It makes me feel alive; it makes me feel whole. I miss him so much when he's not here, and I’m left in this house that feels empty but isn't.

  My mind drifts to Jace and the awkwardness that hangs heavily between us. I want it to change, and for us to be able to talk to one another, so I don't feel isolated in this place. It would be nice to actually have a friend to keep me company when Caleb is away. With my heart aching, I go to his door and brace myself. Biting my bottom lip, I inhale deeply before raising my fist to knock lightly. Tap, tap.

  After a moment the door opens, and a sleep ruffled, shirtless Jace stands at the threshold. The look on his face confuses me...it’s a mix of curiosity, fear, and something else I can’t quite figure out.

  “Mica, why are you knocking on my door?”

  5

  Jace

  Holy shit, Mica is at my bedroom door. Beautiful and forbidden Mica. The woman I lust over every fucking night, and my brother's girlfriend. Feeling a tightness in my boxers, I look down to s
ee the morning wood I'm clearly sporting and subtly try to readjust. Judging by the light blush coloring Mica's cheeks, I wasn't as inconspicuous as I hoped to be. I glance down the hallway, looking for my brother. Shit, she can't be here talking to me like this.

  “What do you want?” I ask her, sharper than is probably necessary, but I can’t risk Caleb seeing us together.

  Mica’s eyes fill with tears. “Caleb didn’t come home last night, and I thought maybe we could hang out. Maybe get to know each other a little better? It gets lonely without him here.”