on the off-chance any of us passed away, we would be able to move forward," he explained. "Sure, we'd still take a blow at any of our deaths, but it would be more of a mental one than physical. Everett never prepared you for the chance of us passing at any moment because it's not a practice encouraged for humans to go through."
"But why though?" I genuinely asked. "I surely could have handled that."
"The problem with humans is that if someone warns you of something, your mind obsesses over it. As supernatural, it's in the back of our mind but it's not something that will be constantly thought about when the world is quiet in the middle of the night, for example," he explained. "As for humans, you’d obsess over the warning and if anything like that manifested, you'd become further paranoid, and well, that's not a way to live. That's one of the many differences between the realms of humans and supernaturals. Our thought processes have similarities but carry a lot of differences. Humans are only now trying to figure out what those differences are, but a supernatural that is experienced with raising our kind, like Everett, already grasps it."
He lowered his mug of coffee to give me his full attention.
"We should have had this discussion when you became a supernatural, but it fully slipped our minds, and then we saw the consequences that our 'disappearance' created."
"Um..." I wasn't sure what to say as his intense gaze made it hard for me to stare into his eyes. "Sorry?"
"You shouldn't be the one apologizing," he muttered and reached out to stroke my cheek before he leaned over just as his hand moved from my cheek to my chin and prompted the turning of my head in his direction - his lips pressing firmly on mine.
"We don't know what's going to happen in these next days or weeks, if we're lucky," he whispered against my lips. "But if we ever perish, don't you dare stop taking care of yourself. You mean the world to us, and I'd be damned in my fucking grave if I knew because of my death you would make yourself suffer like it's your fault."
"It felt like my fault," I honestly replied with sad eyes as I swallowed the lump in my throat. "You guys 'died' at my apparent funeral. I didn't even see it coming. I sensed something was wrong. I knew down in my gut that something bad was about to happen, but I should have sensed it the moment you guys said you were sworn in early. Or your replicas or whatever."
I leaned in further to press my forehead against his as I closed my eyes.
"Even if you guys prepared me for the off-chance you'd pass away, I don't think I could have been the same, Otis." I was being one hundred percent honest. "You guys don't understand how engraved you are into my life. My accomplishments and failures, the simple rises and falls, you guys have been through it all with me. You guys were the family I was so damn grateful to have and now are the loves of my life that are so damn connected to me that losing the four of you felt like I'd lost every petal of my flower heart."
I opened my eyes to see his saddened eyes as I carried on with, "Omarion may have been there to be the steam I needed to remain driven for revenge, but...I know without a doubt that if he wasn't, I would have been nothing but a wilted flower. I would have felt like I'd failed you guys for not being strong enough. For not following my gut and interfering when I should have."
With a sigh, I blinked away my tears and took a deep breath. "I don't regret being hit the way I was, and to be honest, everything was a damn blur. I couldn't acknowledge the idea that I lost all four of you, and I'm sure if I finally accepted the truth of your guys' fate, I'd make sure the world paid for it."
I looked into his eyes again, and I'm sure my conviction was solid as my lips were pressed in a straight line. "I'd make sure the world burned and felt an ounce of the pain I felt at that very moment...and I wouldn't care what side I was on. As long as all those who contributed to your death suffered the consequences."
I expected him