Chapter 113: I can’t think

Elias’s POV

Since mother left the dining room with Noah, I have been sitting frozen at the table. My breathing is unstable. My ears are ringing. And my eyes are staring into space.

My head is reeling with five hundred thoughts at once. There are thoughts of Julian daring to give Noah a claiming collar. Thoughts of killing Julian and making him eat his collar. Thoughts of punishing Noah for hiding the collar from me. And the painful thoughts of losing my cherry blossom boy all over again.

No.

I won’t let that happen. The number of years I’ve spent without him are too much for me to let him go. Noah belongs beside me and he will stay right beside me.

Even if he turns out to be a part of Winslow’s madness, he will remain mine. If I have to break his body into small pieces and turn his bones in a pendant so that I can keep him, I will do it.

He’s made himself mine by giving me his cherry blossom that day.

"Hey...E?" Damien calls and I blink twice to call myself back to the room.

"I’m this close to getting a red flag and waving it in front of you" my older brother says and my dad laughs at the joke while I stare blankly.

"Do you get it? You were steaming like a cartoon bull" Lucas explains and I force myself to breathe properly. I don’t have time for their jokes. My sanity is at stake for the second time in my fucking life.

"Keep your jokes to yourself" I say as I push my cup of coffee away slightly. I’m slowly getting overwhelmed by the strong aroma. I don’t want the smell of coffee, I need the smell of strawberry pheromones.

"We’ll have the meeting with the clan members soon, what information do we have right now?" Dad says and takes a lazy sip of his coffee.

Right. We need to gather all the information and speculations we have together. We already know that Julian is involved with two sides of the world.

We know he was building his connection with Winslow while standing by my father’s side as a friend. There are a few more things we already know too, but fuck, my brain is scrambled at the absence of Noah.

"Elias, come on buddy, we need your big brain right here" my dad says and I squeeze my eyes shut.

"Fuck, I can’t think" I confess.

I’m slowly getting frustrated, so I rub at my temple with two fingers to calm myself, and my brothers look at each other.

"Lucas can tell us what he knows right now" Kai says quietly and I tilt my head at Lucas, giving him the go-ahead to speak.

"I can help with just a few pieces of information, since I only lived in Winslow as a child" Lucas starts.

"Winslow used to be more of a pack than a city. It used to be small and irrelevant, but I’ve got to admit, things started to slowly change and grow as Julian got involved in the city" Lucas says and Kai nods. My younger brother is playing the role of the logical one since I’m out of it at the moment.

"So right now we can make a solid guess of when Julian started getting close to Goldsmith" Kai says.

"That fucker" Damien sneers. He’s already putting two and two together. "Julian saw a place that was still in its seed state and he turned it into his personal tree house" he hisses and I groan.

"Can you remember when exactly?" I ask Lucas who shakes his head.

"I don’t remember much. But whenever Julian visited Winslow, he and the governor’s family used to walk around the city to sightsee and shit" Lucas supplies and I curse.

What could have been Julian’s motive?

"All these must have started when Silas and I rejected Julian’s offer to grow our influence by appealing to richer clients outside of Gotteigen" Dad says and we all turn our attention to him.

"Julian has always been ambitious. We built this place together, I never thought he’d come for my authority or dare to suggest going against every rule I wrote in blood" Dad interlocks his fingers on the table with a frown.

Fuck.

My eyes find Dad’s blind eye. That permanent damage is a reminder of one of the many things he sacrificed for this family, this throne, and this clan.

Julian won’t get away with anything, no, not even with a lock of Noah’s hair.

"Should we say Goldsmith is an innocent fool?" Lucas asks.

"No innocent fool would sell his own son twice for money or safety" I say with a growl and Damien sighs.

"No innocent fool would turn his own city into a trafficking center" my older brother says and Kai’s eyes light up like he just had a brilliant thought.

"Goldsmith is not innocent. That bastard has been working his ass off to promote Winslow as the ’natural wonder’ and a ’traditional getaway from the loud world’. Winslow and its dirty business might have stayed unnoticed by us for a few more years, if not for Elias’s fixation with Noah" Kai says.

"We need to gather data of who moved in when, who did what. Create a clear board for our targets" Dad points at Kai.

"Something doesn’t add up...Noah was in Gotteigen the same day we got kidnapped by Julian" I say.

"Yeah, he was apparently kidnapped by a person called Conan but right now Noah can’t remember who Conan is" Lucas says.

"Okay. So, we have to find this Conan person and interrogate him" Damien says with a grin. He’s always ready and excited to spill blood.

"We’ll search the basement to see if he’s among the prisoners and if he’s not, we’ll have to visit Winslow" I say quietly.

"Agreed" Dad clears his throat and gets up.

He looks commanding despite being of average height and being blind in one eye. This man, the Peter Pan of the real world, has never lost a single battle.

I can trust my father to see to it that I win and keep Noah.

"We’ll have that meeting in a few minutes. In the meanwhile, bring your head back to this world, Elias. We need your brain" he says and leaves the room.

Once dad is out, Damien puts his legs on the table, and I wince at the way he folds his arms behind his head and spreads his thighs.

Mom will kill him.

"Wanna play football before we think of chaos, death, famine, and conquest?" he asks with a cocky grin and I sigh tiredly.

Fucking asshole.

I reach for my pocket watch and check the time. It’s been twenty-six minutes, ten seconds since mom took Noah away. Where are they now? What the hell are they doing and when the fuck are they coming back?

I am pissed at him for not telling me about Julian’s collar. I don’t fully trust him. He makes me so mad but...

...I miss him already.