Seduced by My Childhood Sweetheart’s Brother
Chapter 132

Strings of Fate

132- Internet and instruments

After about an hour I can see that the tension has left him and he now looks almost sleepy, kind of like Iwas before he came home upset. I’m glad my relaxing videos worked for him too, I don’t know whatkind of other stuff he might replace soothing. To be fair, it could also be that he is curled up on the couchwith me and it’s really comfortable. It’s hard to stay angry in a position like this. I swap to the internetbrowser and ask Bellamy what helps him feel relaxed. He pushes my hands aside to type in;

Ryann Gale.

1 laugh and hit search. Not a lot comes up. There’s a reference to me in some school news bulletinfrom several years ago before I graduated. Some links to my social media, but it’s mostly set to privateso you can’t see much.

“I’ve searched you before.” Bellamy admits. I raise an eyebrow.

“Really? When?” I ask.

“Not long after we met. I was curious about you. Just like now, it didn’t give much in the way of results. Iwas almost desperate enough to ask Alex to look into you, but I decided against it. It seemed like itmight be a breach of privacy, and I was kind of hoping you might share more about yourself on yourown, If I could only bring myself to actually ask about you.” He confesses. I feel a rush of appreciationfor his self control..

“Thanks for that. If there’s something you want to know, you can definitely just ask me. Okay?” Iconfirm and Bellamy nods his agreement. It’s awkward and quiet so I decide to type his name into thesearch bar next. I giggle at the huge amount of results that come back. As the Feline Alpha he’s pretty

well known and his actions fairly regularly make the papers and such. There are also pictures of himlinked to several of his businesses and so on. There are also some more depressing news articlesabout his parents passing that I flick past quickly. In the end, I flip it to an image search to see whatcomes up. There aren’t many pictures of him in his cat form. Probably because he doesn’t go walkingaround town like that and people aren’t meant to come onto the Shifter land. One picture in particularcatches my attention, mostly because I’m in it. It’s from Megan’s engagement party and it captures themoment when he was holding my shoe hostage, just before we danced together. It’s on someone’ssocial media but the account is mostly private so I can’t see more than that. I can’t help but

132- Internet and instruments

cringe. I look like a child, even in my fancy dress, Bickering with Bellamy like a little kid, a look of pureoutrage on my face. Bellamy’s face is only half–visible in the photo but despite that, I can tell that hisexpression is positively gleeful.

“Oooh, save that and send it to me!” Bellamy demands and I scrunch up my face.

“No way, I was hoping to replace a way to erase it.” I grumble. Bellamy looks aghast.

“But why? You look adorable, and it’s not like I have tons of other photos of us.” He objects. I roll myeyes.

“Surely there has to be a better photo than that!” I complain. Bellamy shrugs.

“I’m not sure. A lot of people took photos at the party, but after the spectacle of a wedding…. well not alot of people have shared them or come forward with them. Additionally since very few people knowwho you are, they won’t have tagged you. I have accounts set up, but I don’t really use social media

much because too many people bother me on it or read into the things I write. I have to think thingsthrough too much,” He admits. I shrug.

“I never used it much because I didn’t have much in the way of friends to keep up with, I’mcontemplating using it more in the future.” I think aloud and Bellamy nods.

“You should. I bet you would replace yourself with more friends than you expect.”

“Maybe. Next time you get a chance, make sure to friend me okay?” Bellamy agrees happily, his eyesstill locked on the photo of us together. His

calculating. I narrow

my eyes.

pouts.

“No, you can’t have this photo.” I repeat and Bellamy

“But I want a photo of us.” He practically whines. I roll my eyes and grab my phone out.

“Smile.” I sing out and snap a selfie off the two of us.

“Now a silly face.” I continue. Bellamy and I take a silly photo together.

“And now-” I’m cut off by Bellamy taking the phone from me. He presses his lips to my cheek

and I can hear a clicking sound as he snaps a picture.

132- Internet and instruments

“Hey I wasn’t ready!” I complain and Bellamy just laughs. I hear his own phone chime in hist pocket andI assume he sent the photos to himself. I snatch my phone back to check the pictures. The first two areokay. That last one though… Bellamy looks incredibly sweet, and 1 look… bewildered. Great, ugh. Ican’t be bothered arguing because from the way Bellamy is beaming, there’s no way he’s getting rid ofthe photo. On the bright side, he’s cheered up

and

no longer looks like he wants to go fight someone. So that’s good at least.

My

thoughts fade back to Kiara. She has no family left, and at this point the police are barely looking forher, they have pretty much assumed her dead or sold off somewhere. But I KNOW she’s alive, andsomehow I know she’s also still somewhere nearby. But people are moving on, like she never evenexisted. It’s awful. I’m not even thinking, It’s almost against my own will, I type Kiara Brooks into thecomputer search bar. I hesitate before hitting search, not sure 1 even want to see the results. Bellamylearns forward and hits search for me. Apparently I’m not the only one who is morbidly curious. The firstfew posts are all recent news articles. I skip past them, not interested, I just want to see somethingelse, anything that proves she has a life waiting for her when we replace her. I replace a link to a schoolbulletin and select it. She was given an award last year for music. She plays the violin. There’s a photofrom a school recital, Kiara’s face is serious and her brows pulled together in focus. Her blonde hair ispulled back away from her face and she is clearly concentrating. Her posture is confident and she looksfar more confident handling the instrument than I would expect any child to look. But it’s not the violinshe’s holding that has me riveted. No, she is wearing a white sundress. It’s an adorable outfit, all laceand flowers. But what this dress makes me realise is that this is the first picture I’ve seen of herwearing short sleeves. Sure, that doesn’t seem like much of a big deal, but it is, because I can see themark weaving around her upper arm, and for the first time in my life, I have found a mark that is just likemine.