Owned By The Psychotic Billionaire (Mafia BL)

Chapter 114: The Light Fades As We Go

ADRIEN’S POV

SEVEN YEARS AGO...

"Fuck off," I say, my voice trembling with a chaotic mix of cold rage, suffocating terror, and mounting, visceral horror.

"I don’t have any poison for Orion. I’m not part of any sick plan, and I’m never, under any circumstances, giving myself to you, so get the fuck away from me."

I stare straight into Leon’s pale, angelic face, and for the first time in my life, I truly see right through a person’s perfectly clean exterior.

I see the dark, desperate hunger burning behind those bright blue eyes. I see the deep, crippling inferiority complex, the hidden fear of his own irrelevance, and the pathetic, burning need to be something he is not.

He wants what is not his. He wants to snatch away whatever Orion touches just to feel like he matters, just to prove to himself that he is not sitting in his cousin’s shadow like an abandoned ghost.

The thought of offering my body to him like a piece of flesh just so he can build up his own fragile ego sickens me to my gut.

My stomach turns over itself, hot and sour with disgust.

"Get out of my room, Leon," I say, taking a firm, unyielding step toward the door. "Get the hell out right now before I scream."

Leon does not look intimidated in the slightest. A sharp, mocking smile spreads slowly across his pale lips as he tilts his head back, watching me like a child playing with a bug.

"Don’t pretend to be this self-righteous saint, Adrien," Leon counters softly, his voice dripping with casual cruelty. "You act like you are too pure, too noble to hand yourself over to survive, but what exactly are you doing with Orion? Are you not just giving him sexual pleasure to keep him from crushing your neck?"

My heart drops straight into my stomach like a heavy stone. A wave of icy dread crawls up my spine, freezing the blood in my veins.

My mind races back to two months ago, to the shadow of the metal racks inside the dark, suffocating janitor’s locker, where Orion had backed me into a corner and pressed his mouth against mine until I couldn’t breathe.

"Stop," I whisper, my voice cracking violently down the middle. My hands shake so badly I have to jam them against my sides. "How long have you been watching me?"

"A long, long time," Leon replies, his eyes shining with a strange, unnatural delight that makes my skin crawl. "I see everything you do, Adrien. I know every single place you try to hide."

"You are a sick creep," I snap, my fists trembling at my sides as my chest heaves. "You are a pathetic loser with a massive inferiority complex. Get out of my room before I lose my fucking mind!"

Leon lets out a soft laugh that sounds far too sweet for the poison dripping from his lips. He raises his pale hands in a mocking gesture of peace.

"I’m only trying to help you," Leon says smoothly, his tone shifting into something oddly persuasive. "All you have to do is set aside your stupid, useless pride and take my hand. Look at yourself, Adrien. Apart from me, who else in this world is going to help you? Do you really think that little friend of yours, Timothy, can protect you from what is coming?"

Leon scoffs, stepping slowly toward the exit. "Timothy is even worse off than you are. It would take someone like you, with the tiny, pathetic scrap of power your family name gives you, zero effort to crush him into dust. Imagine what I could do to him, or what Orion does to people like him every single day just for breathing the same air."

"Shut up!" I yell, my throat burning as the sound tears out of me. "My friendship is not measured by the disgusting standards of people like you! I don’t make friends with someone just to think about hurting them! And you are right about one thing—I have no power at all! I’m seventeen years old and I have nothing! So how the hell am I going to crush my own friend? Get out!"

Leon just chuckles, shaking his head with an air of tragic pity as he reaches for the brass door handle. He pulls the heavy wooden door open to step out into the hallway, but he stops dead in his tracks.

Standing right outside the threshold, his hand raised in mid-air as if he was just about to knock, is Timothy.

My breath catches in my throat, freezing solid. I stare at Timothy, my mind spinning in complete, frantic panic. I look desperately at his face, trying to read whatever emotion is written there, but his expression is entirely blank.

His eyes are flat, dull, and completely unreadable. I can’t tell how long he has been standing in the corridor. I can’t tell if he heard Leon talking about the poison, about the kiss in the janitor’s locker, or about the weirdly terrifying, confusing feelings growing inside me for Orion.

Timothy slowly lifts his head, his gaze shifting from me to the blonde boy standing in our doorway.

The moment Timothy’s eyes land on Leon, the blankness on his face shatters into a look of pure, raw, unadulterated hatred. His knuckles turn stark white as he grips the strap of his black backpack.

The hatred he’s exuding feels almost physical.

"Why is a Vassilis like you in our room?" Timothy asks, his voice low, rough, and dripping with venom. "What the hell are you looking for here?"

Leon does not bother to answer. He lets out a quiet, dismissive scoff, stepping past Timothy without giving him a second glance.

As he passes, Leon deliberately drives his shoulder hard into Timothy’s chest, knocking him slightly off balance against the doorframe.

Neither of us moves to stop him. We are just two powerless boys watching in silence as Leon walks away down the wooden hallway, his light steps fading into the quiet building.

Timothy clears his throat softly, his eyes fixed firmly on the floorboards between us. "Is this a new technique by the Vassilis family to pick on you now? Is picking on you the new Vassilis family hobby?"

I let out a quick, nervous chuckle, the sound forcing its way out of my dry throat like broken glass. "I... I’m not really sure what is going on, to be honest. He just came in."

A small, desperate wave of relief washes over my tight chest. Since Timothy is not asking me any dangerous questions, it must mean he did not hear anything important.

He must have walked up right as Leon was opening the door. He didn’t hear about the kiss. He couldn’t have.

"It’s almost evening," I say quickly, my voice high and tight as I try to change the subject before the heavy silence can weigh on us. "Should we go down to the main hall and grab some dinner?"

Timothy nods slowly, his face returning to that quiet, unreadable state. "Yeah. Let us go eat. I’m starving."

We walk down to the dining hall together, side by side, but the distance between us feels like a mile wide.

Throughout the entire meal, I make a conscious effort not to look directly at Timothy. I keep my eyes glued to my plate, shoving forkfuls of rice into my mouth without tasting a single bite. I tell myself that everything is fine.

I tell myself that we are safe, that we are just normal students surviving another day, and I desperately cling to the comfortable lie that nothing has changed between us.

The next morning, the resort staff leads our second-year class out to the wide, dusty fields for horse-riding practice.

The morning air is crisp and cool, blowing softly through the tall pine trees that border the wooden stables. For a few brief hours, things almost feel normal.

Timothy and I ride our horses side by side along the fence perimeter, chatting about simple, meaningless things like the cold weather and the upcoming upper-class exams.

I avoid all the people I know I need to avoid, keeping my horse far away from the main cluster of wealthy heirs who gather near the grand canopy.

Yet, no matter how far I ride, I can feel a heavy pair of eyes boring straight into the back of my neck from across the field.

I don’t need to look up to know it is Orion. I can feel the weight of his stare dragging against my skin like a hot knife, filled with heavy, chaotic, unspoken emotions that I’m too terrified, and way too emotionally exhausted to identify.

Standing a few feet away from him is Louise, her face twisted in a sharp glare. Her dark green eyes flash back and forth between her boyfriend and me, filled with pure, burning hatred because she can clearly see that Orion is staring at me instead of paying attention to a single word she says.

And then, off to the far side of the wooden stables, standing under the dark shadow of a grand oak tree, is another pair of eyes.

I turn my head slightly and spot Leon standing there, his pale blonde hair catching the bright morning light. I narrow my eyes and sneer at him in disgust before quickly snapping my head away.

I hate that little blond bastard.