No One Will Ever Hurt You Again I Promise-Chapter 65: It’s just a bad joke

Howie stroked Ravi’s head, who licked his cheek as a response to tell him he understood and would be nice since he was the most rambunctious of the pack. A small smile crossed Howie’s lips, softening his gaze before he kissed the adorable little pup’s head.

They have grown so much! He feels like they’ve never been babies before, and he hasn’t seen them playing with Aike on the kitchen floor and rolling around with Ayke on that same floor like he’s one of them.

He switches on the ignition, the car engine hums, and his happy little band gets a little more excited at the soft hum of the engine. They are sure he does not intend to play a dirty trick on them and marinate them like idiots. He is going to take them for a ride, for real.

Howie used to play some filthy tricks on them. At that time, he had only them and Marc, and he could only annoy them and play with them like they were human.

The gate slid to the side, opening the passage for him. With the momentum worthy of a racing driver, he launched the car towards the exit, which would have given Marc a heart attack if he had witnessed the scene. However, he still heard him start the damn car as if he had the devil in his ass.

Marc remembers that he told him to be careful and asked him to drive this car reasonably. And here he is, not even thirty meters away from him, embarking on a mad race without worrying that he will be banned from driving for the next few days.

He finishes getting ready and checks all the exits from the house to make sure everything is closed properly before getting the Kerfs into the BMW.

The latter takes place in the car’s back seats, calmly waiting for him to join them. When Marc arrived, he was surprised to find them both sitting silently in the back. He went in without saying a word. He glanced at them in the rearview mirror, but they pretended not to notice his presence. "They’re kidding me," Marc purred.

He switched on the ignition without saying a word, but something scratched him and prevented him from starting the car. He has this urge to make them understand that he is not their driver, and if one of them sits in the front, that does not mean he will separate them from each other or eat them.

He turned to them and decided to tell them what he had in mind, but when he noticed the lost and frightened look of Oliver, who was looking at him with wide eyes, he sighed and returned to his steering wheel.

While Perth, on his side, doesn’t give a damn about all his fuss, pretending he’s busy staring out the window, his peripheral gaze is watching Marc’s every move with precision. But once Marc returned to his steering wheel, he slipped his hand towards his brother’s hand resting on the leather seat and squeezed it gently.

Oliver looked up at him and smiled, but Perth wasn’t even looking at him, and Marc didn’t miss a thing in this little scene.

He doesn’t know how long he hasn’t been driving with Howie sitting in the back seat unless the latter wants to give him a headache and decides to put a little distance between them. Still, since the boys’ arrival, it’s rare that he gets angry or does something stupid just because he wants to play with Marc’s nerves and drive him crazy.

He doesn’t even run away like a toddler anymore to eat poisoned junk food, as Marc calls it. And the last time the latter made a face at him was when he discovered his biological father and Marc were plotting to kill him without a shadow of remorse if he were to wake up.

It was a low blow from his parents, and he took it very badly, but he understood their maneuver and why he was so scared, and now they don’t even know where the hell that crazy Fenrir is that the prophecy had announced the return of.

Marc drives quietly as his passengers are not the talkative types, and he realizes that he likes this little runt dressed in all black sitting in the back who watches him without even showing it.

He has what it takes to make a good lookout and a good agent, and if he wants, he can train him later when they have gotten to know each other better and especially when he trusts him enough with his life and that of his brother.

He let his thoughts go aside to better focus on what he went out for. He needs a strong chain and a solid leather collar that won’t give in and hurt the cub wolf from the first little obstacle and resistance encounter to attach Oliver this evening. He knows in which part of the city he will find the necessary equipment.

He never had time to get these things for Howie since they took the necessary precautions to ensure that the latter never found himself near one of his congeners; they were confident he would never wake up. And he didn’t even have time to see him go through all the stages of the first transformation. But hey, we all already know what happened that day.

Oliver ends up cracking up. He can’t take any more of all this silence that surrounds him as if he were alone in this car, and he is sure that even if he were alone, it would not be so heavy and sinister. He begins to fidget in his seat like a child who has stayed in one place far too long. It’s time to play with another little friend now.

Perth threw him a questioning look from the corner of his eye. He knows his brother is far from being like him. His brother hates the calm that is likely to turn into a nightmare. He finds it challenging to remain cloistered for too long and even less so to lock himself in silence as bitter as that which weighs on this car.

The little wolf is a light sleeper, and his mother didn’t give a damn about it when she was alive. There’s only one moment in his life when he has no problem with calm and silence; that’s when he falls asleep. Once he’s fallen asleep, everything has to be quiet so that he can rest.

It is impossible to ignore his brother by throwing him those questioning looks that Perth knows very well he will not answer. This one decides to give him a little of his attention by turning to him.

"Okay, you won, Oliver. I’m listening. What’s wrong? Oli jumped slightly at the raspy sound of his brother’s voice and went to curl up at the other end of the car like an ashamed kitten.

At the muffled sound of Perth’s voice, he knew that the latter was lost in his thoughts, perhaps thinking about their situation and looking for a way to protect them and get out of the Huckleberry house as soon as possible. He already knows he’s not a big fan of El, and Howie seems way too nice to be true.

No teenager of his stature and beauty is kind and lovable. They are all first-class assholes who ridicule others and make them unhappy in every way possible. Howie has what it takes to make anyone depressed to the point of killing themselves without even speaking to them, and it will be worse if the latter decides to take an active part in making the lives of others a living hell.

So, when he sees Howie behaving like he’s not one of those assholes hiding under his snobbish and aristocratic looks, he has this urge to make him confess his misdeeds. And it’s even worse when he sees how captivated his brother is by the latter; he even sees him follow Howie with his gaze. He quickly has to find a way to get them out of this house, about which he knows absolutely nothing.

When Marc tried to clean his wound, he only looked at Howie, who was busy gathering his dogs and their things, toys, and everything they would need for the stay.

He didn’t like it, and what annoyed him, even more, was that Howie didn’t glance at Oliver because he was pretending to be absorbed in his actions.

The son of a bitch! Howie certainly felt his brother’s urgent gaze on him since even a mere human like himself knows when someone is staring at him intensely. What about those people with sharp and refined senses?

He felt his first intervention was a little harsh and abrupt. He ran a weary hand through his hair, took a deep breath, and then turned to his brother, who had taken refuge at the other end of the car, far from him, and forced a smile. A smile that seems carved in poor-quality stone under the fingers of a craftsman who is not a sculptor, who is not gifted, and who, above all, has no love and passion for his work.

Oliver smiles inwardly at his effort. Trying to smile when there’s someone else with them is a struggle. He knows it’s not easy for him, but he would have preferred that he did not smile, although he believes that Marc will not use this ridiculous image of his brother to tease him. He’s not sure El would do the same; thank goodness there’s only Mark.

" Talk to me, I’m listening, and I apologize for being so rude earlier, okay?"

Marc, who hasn’t missed the sight of that horrible smile, fights against himself not to burst out laughing and strangely misses El, the shitty little rascal. He’s taken up so much space that now it saddens him if he’s not there to share childish bullshit with him; the kid has a bad influence on him, but hey, it doesn’t matter since he took a picture.

He’s good at taking embarrassing photos of Howie for his dad, who always asks him to send him his progress and share his daily exploits with him. At least that way, he will feel less absent in his life.

And he’s way too proud of that catch he got today. He hopes that one day he will be able to show it to Perth without the latter stabbing him in his sleep with those piercing and threatening looks he throws at everyone around him except his brother, the lucky and blessed one.

“It’s nothing. I’m fine; you know me, all this silence makes me feel uncomfortable. It’s terrifying to stay like this when there are three of us in the car." 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦

"If you have something to say, why don’t you do it?" asks Perth, who has regained all of his soft and protective sides. “How could I? "You were absorbed, contemplating the landscape and lost in your thoughts, and Mr. Huckleburry has not said a word since he got into the car, and I don’t even have my phone and headset anymore."

A few seconds passed without Perth finding the kindest way to respond to his brother without rushing him. When he thinks this one keeps reminding him every time, he’s the older of the two. "Older my ass, he’s just a balky, grumpy baby."

He does not seem to find the exact words to answer him; maybe he is too busy thinking about his brother, who needs to remind him that he is older than him. Marc tries to place two words in the conversation since his name has also been mentioned.

He cleared his throat to remind them he was still here and had heard it all. “ Oliver, you can call me Marc like El does, and sometimes Howie does too. And if you have any questions, whatever the nature of these questions, I am ready to listen to you, and that goes for your brother too."

He glanced at his brother, who seemed to be asking his brother’s approval to respond to Marc. Perth nodded affirmatively, and his gaze softened radically as he saw the enthusiast take place on his brother’s handsome, almost childlike face. The so-called older brother opened his eyes wide, his cheeks forming a tiny, adorable heart shape, revealing two pretty dimples.

“Pff, my big brother! It’s just a bad joke," Perth grumbled as a small, candid, and very discreet smile formed on his lips.