Page 85 of Phantom Flower

Rei nodded. “Every day. Sometimes multiple times a night. But since I came here… they stopped.”

I pulled him closer again, resting my chin on top of his head. “What are they about?” I asked.

“My dad… and how he died.”

I already knew many details about him. I had stalked every inch of his life. But I had deliberately avoided digging into his father’s death. It felt too private.

“How did he die?”

“A car accident. In Tokyo. There was so much blood. It was everywhere. I still feel it sometimes.”

I remembered that night I drove him to the woods, the way his face had gone deathly pale when I sped up, how he had looked one second away from a full panic attack. I had done that to him. I had dragged him back into his trauma that day too. The apology sat on my tongue, but I knew it would not be enough. It would not erase what I had done.

So instead, I gave him a piece of myself I had never given anyone.

“I also sometimes dream about my mother.”

Rei’s expression softened. His hand came up to caress my face. “She died too?”

I nodded slowly. “She killed herself. She was always depressive… but my father didn’t make it easier for her. Their marriage was an alliance for money. He was cold to her, and when she got worse, he brought in doctors and pills, but he was never there. I was ten when she… when I found her body.”

Rei’s eyes were teary again, but this time I could feel they were for me. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “You didn’t deserve that.”

Neither did he.

“We’re both a little broken, aren’t we?” I murmured.

He gave me a sad smile. “Maybe… we can be broken together.”

I realized then that I wanted to be the man who kept the nightmares away from this fragile boy in my arms.

And I would spend every single day trying to be exactly that.

The next few days, I did not let Rei go back to school.

He did not argue. He was too mentally exhausted. Every time I suggested staying home, he simply nodded with that hollow look in his eyes that made me want to burn the entire world down. So I kept him in the mansion, safe, under my watch.

Right now, he was curled up in my bedroom, sitting by the large window. The orange blossom I had placed in his hair that morning still sat above his ear. He looked peaceful for the first time in days. I wanted to keep it that way.

I stepped out, closing the door behind me, and welcomed Alexei and Ilya into the private lounge downstairs.

We sat down, me in the large leather armchair, Alexei leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, and Ilya sprawled lazily across the couch.

“Did you find something?” I asked immediately.

Ever since that bastard had drugged Rei at the party, I had put Ilya on the trail. He was the best hacker in the country, maybe even the continent. Nothing stayed hidden from him for long. But this had turned into a fucking snake pit.

Ilya’s usual manic smile was still on his face, even now. He tilted his head, spinning a knife between his fingers like it was a toy.

“Well… I tracked down twenty different people so far,” he said cheerfully, like we were discussing the weather. “It’s a beautiful mess. The guy who drugged Rei was hired by someone else. That someone was hired by another. And that one was paid by yet another. It keeps looping. Like someone really doesn’t want us to find the root.”

Alexei shifted. “Before we go deeper into that rabbit hole… you should know your father—”

“No,” I cut him off. “Anything involving my father can wait. Nothing comes before this. I’m almost certain the same person who paid for the drugging is the same sick fuck who put those fingers in Rei’s locker. I want their name. Everything else is secondary.”

Alexei sighed, rubbing his jaw. “Dimitri, you’re in too deep with this boy. You need to—”

“Save yourself the speech,” I warned. “I don’t give a fuck how deep I am. He’s mine. Someone is trying to hurt him. I will find them, and when I do, I’m going to make their death last for days.”