Total pages in book: 152
Estimated words: 147545 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 738(@200wpm)___ 590(@250wpm)___ 492(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 147545 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 738(@200wpm)___ 590(@250wpm)___ 492(@300wpm)
How different tonight would have been if he’d been here.
How different everything was when he was here.
I loved my brother.
So did everybody else.
He was Dad’s first-choice heir.
Cassie’s first pick, too.
That was disappointing, but I don’t hold it against her. She didn’t really know me back then. She knows me now, and she likes what she sees… most of the time.
The first time my brother and I liked the same girl, it was Cassie Pritchard.
It was seventh grade.
He made a move first.
She rejected him.
Looking back, I don’t know if it was because she didn’t like him (as I thought at the time). I think it was because she wasn’t ready to like anybody. Cassie was a late bloomer. She didn’t start dating until years later, and by that time, Tim wasn’t thinking about her anymore.
I still was, but she didn’t even see me. It was a common occurrence. I was used to it by then, but it irked me more when it was her. Most girls were drawn to Tim before they had a chance to notice me, but I didn’t care what most girls did.
I cared when it was Cassie.
I wasn’t obsessed with her or anything, but she caught my attention back then and never really lost it. I always imagined she’d visit our lake house someday, and I always imagined it would be with me.
It wasn’t.
The second time my brother and I liked the same girl, it was Cassie Pritchard.
It was high school.
She was dating Russell Wilcox, but it seemed like their relationship was winding down. “I wonder if he’s fucked her yet,” Tim said one day, tossing a football in the backyard.
I wondered that, too.
Tim smirked. “I’m gonna invite her over this weekend.”
I shook my head, tossing the ball back. “Don’t do that.”
“Why not? She deserves to have a little fun, doesn’t she? Russell has micro dick energy. She can do better.”
It was like a boulder landed in my gut because I knew exactly who he had in mind, and it wasn’t only me being territorial. I knew my brother well enough to know he wouldn’t stay interested in Cassie and he’d end up treating her like shit.
He would also ruin my chances.
Once she got involved with him, she would never see me.
So, I had to make sure that didn’t happen.
I had to make sure Cassie Pritchard would never steal flirty fucking looks over her shoulder at my brother while I was sitting right next to her ever again.
Tricking her wasn’t hard. We’re identical twins, and Cassie is convinced she can tell us apart in person, but no one can. Not unless we want them to.
And that night, I didn’t want her to.
It needed to be Tim who attacked her so that eventually, once the dust settled, I could swoop in.
Only there ended up being a lot more dust—and a lot more damage—than I anticipated in the aftermath of that particular demolition.
Tim knew I raped her.
He wasn’t even shy about asking.
He knew if he didn’t rape her and someone who looked like him did, there was only one option.
“What the fuck, Tor?”
I shrugged, then I lied. “I was drunk. It was a mistake.”
It wasn’t a mistake. I knew exactly what I was doing, and I accomplished my mission, though with much more collateral damage than I intended.
Once Tim knew I’d been inside her, he never looked at Cassie that way again.
And, of course, she didn’t look at him that way, either.
He figured it was innocent—or drunken—confusion that she couldn’t tell us apart and thought he had been the perpetrator, and in my family, you don’t throw each other beneath the wheels of an oncoming bus. It was decided quickly that since he was already the target of the accusations, he would bear the brunt of them. Besides, he knew it wouldn’t be that bad. People like us more than they like Cassie. They would want to believe us over her.
We had excellent lawyers working the case, and I used lube and a condom so I didn’t hurt her too much. I didn’t know it would be her first time. I figured she may have had sex with Russell until I felt the resistance, heard her wrenching cries when I shoved past it, and saw the blood on her thighs when I pulled out.
I was careful enough not to cause any excessive physical damage to her that she couldn’t prove it wasn’t a consensual act. Once it became clear that was the path we were taking, no one thought she would be masochistic enough to see it through.
Maybe she didn’t know then that the victim is the one who faces scrutiny when she speaks out, not the perpetrator.
She knows now.
We offered her a good sum of money at the start of it all, hoping to avoid the fight altogether, but my sweet Cassie didn’t settle like we thought she would. She didn’t want money. She wanted justice, and she held on for dear life as she was dragged through every filthy puddle, certain that somehow justice would prevail.