Page 44 of Sincerely, Butterfly

Wesley is nice enough to let her keep getting Botox because trust me, no one wants to see her face when she misses her injections.

My situation is similar to Wesley’s. I’m both head of the company as well as holding my family's position in the Brotherhood. A process that was long and fucking taxing.

But so, so worth it.

You see, my father was a sick bastard. And that's not saying much because most people in the Brotherhood don’t have many morals.

I grew up watching that bastard beat my mother daily. He got a sick satisfaction at making her cry, at hearing her beg for mercy.

All while I had to sit back and watch, unable to do anything about it. Not that I didn’t try, I did. When things got bad, I tried to fight back, but he was bigger, stronger.

I paid the price with broken bones and bruises. It wasn’t until he started threatening my younger sister, Calliope, that I found the strength and a way to stop it.

As much as it killed me to watch my mother in pain, to see her so broken and defeated, she was an adult and could technically fight for herself. But my sister was just a young kid. I wasn’t going to allow that to happen to her.

I couldn’t protect my mother, but I’d die protecting my sister.

My father saw my sister as nothing more than a parasite. He believed that women had no business in our world, and for the mostpart, that's true. No woman has ever been of value or a part of the Brotherhood.

Still, most women who had family members in the Brotherhood were at least treated with basic respect. They were their daughters, their wives, their mothers, and sisters.

To my father, Callie was nothing but a mistake. Not to be seen or heard.

She went to school like all the other kids, but outside of that, she was locked away in our house. Sure, she had all the toys a kid could want, a pool, and even a fucking pony.

What's the point of all that if you're alone?

That's why the guys and I did our best to make her happy. We took care of her, made sure she was loved and hardly alone.

Sadly, as we got older and took on more responsibilities, our time with her became less and less.

When I was twelve, my mother died. She killed herself, unable to take any more of my father’s abuse. It nearly broke me. For years, I hated myself—blamed myself for not doing more.

Of course, dear old Pops couldn’t have the world think he was the reason she was gone, not when they put on the perfect persona of a happy couple. People never saw the bruises, never saw the scars. She always covered up with makeup.

But I did. I saw every single mark on her skin.

He told the world she died of cancer, that the reason she looked so tired and weak was because she was battling it in private.

At her funeral, I almost pulled the gun from one of the security guard’s holsters and shot him right in the head. If my age wasn’t a factor, I would have done it.

I was too young to have any claim on my place in the Brotherhood or the company. Someone else would have taken my place, leaving my sister to be placed god knows where with god knows who.

I’m not sure if I would have gone to jail for it, not sure if the power my family held would be extended to me in regard to a public execution.

I had to play the long game. Keep my head down, do as I was told, learn the ropes, and keep my sister safe.

That was the plan… in theory.

Mom wasn’t even cold in the ground before my father remarried. Only. Two. Fucking Months Later.

Starla Kinsmin was some money-hungry whore. Dad wanted a hot young thing, and didn’t even care about the fact that she was young enough to be our older sister.

I hated her from the moment I met her and knew something was wrong. She was too fake, and she tried too hard.

I had nothing on her until I found Callie with a black eye, crying in her room. I thought it was Dad, who had finally given in to his threat to hurt her.

Nope, it was Starla. Callie liked the color of her lipstick and used it. Starla found out and punched a fucking nine-year-old in the eye.