They Called Me A Defective Copy Of My Sister Chapter 11

They Called Me A Defective Copy Of My Sister Chapter 11

I slept deeper than I had in years. The doorbell ripped me out of it sharp, insistent,

relentless.

Silas was still dead asleep, his tail coiled around my ankle like he was afraid I’d disappear. I

eased free, pulled my robe shut, and went to the door.

Ruby. Oversized trench coat, tired face – but her eyes were sharper than I’d ever seen them.

For once, she didn’t open with a jab. She just looked at me with a smile I couldn’t quite place.

“Ruby?” I wasn’t expecting her.

She didn’t come in – just leaned against the doorframe and lit a cigarette. “I sent Vance

home. Idiot.”

A lazy ribbon of smoke drifted between us. “It didn’t take long to figure out something was

wrong.”

“The guy pretending to be Silas didn’t even know I’m allergic to mangoes.” She paused. “But

that’s not what gave him away.”

—

—

Her eyes dropped to my neck – to the fresh mark there – and one corner of her mouth

curled. “He didn’t have his scent.”

“That feral edge. Like something half-wild that’s been kicked too many times and still bites.”

My pulse stumbled. She’d known all along.

Ruby tapped the ash off her cigarette and stared past me at nothing.

“Hazel, I’ve always known I was the one who saved him. But he’s spent this whole time

thinking it was you.”

“I liked being wanted. So I let the lie stand.” She exhaled. “But watching him these last two

days – going through the motions, pretending I was enough I got sick of the performance.”

“You can’t fake the real thing.”

She straightened up and turned to go – all sharp angles and careless grace.

“Oh, and Vance is probably on his way. If that scrappy little wolf of yours actually wants to be

your husband, he’ll need to get the paperwork straightened out.”

“Don’t embarrass me.”

I watched her walk away, and it hit me. Ruby had been the sharpest person in the room all

along.

She was barely out of sight when Vance’s car pulled up.

He looked wrecked. His usually immaculate suit was creased, his tie yanked loose.

When I opened the door, something flared in his eyes – hope, maybe – and then it died just

as fast. “Hazel…”

His voice scraped. “I’m sorry. The trip got cut short.”

“Things got… complicated with Ruby.” He was lying. I let him.

“I know.” I stepped aside so he could see past me.

Two place settings on the dining table. By the door, Silas’s boots sat beside mine – paired

like they belonged there.

From the bedroom

–

the unmistakable thud of a tail knocking a chair over.

Vance went white.

“He’s… in there?” He couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe.

His hand shook as he pointed toward the bedroom door. “Hazel, do you have any idea who he

is?”

“That’s Silas – my own brother! How could you – ”

“I know.” The words cut him off clean.

“He’s Silas. He’s 07. And he’s the only person I’ve ever loved.”

Vance stared at me like he was seeing me for the first time. “You knew? This whole time?”

“How long? Since I left – or before that?”

Every mask in the room dropped at once. The bedroom door swung open.

Silas stepped up behind me, shirtless, his tail sweeping around my waist – possessive,

deliberate, unmistakable.

The nerves were gone. When he looked at Vance, his eyes were all wolf.

“Vance.”

His voice was ice. “Your little performance is over.”

“She’s mine. You’re done playing the husband.”

Vance’s gaze dropped to our hands – fingers locked together, knuckles white.

The woman he’d dismissed as a cheap substitute was looking at his brother like he was the

sun. And the love Vance had chased his whole life had been a ghost story from the start.

—

He sagged against the doorframe – all the fight gone from him – and let out something

almost like a laugh.

“So the only one left chasing a ghost… was me.”

That night, Vance stood outside our door for a long time. Then he reached into his jacket, pulled out a document, and set it on the entryway table.

“This is the registry board’s report on the matching error – the wrong name I put on my original application. And a medical certificate confirming our mental-energy incompatibility.”

His voice sounded lighter than I’d ever heard it. “They say there are no annulments in this world. But a critical systemic error… it’s a loophole.”

“Hazel, I spent this whole marriage thinking I was the one settling. I never once considered that you might have been settling too – that you had someone you were burning for, the

same way I did.”

“I cost you three years.”

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He looked past me one last time at Silas, at me, at the way we held each other.

Then he turned and walked into the dark. He didn’t look back. His shoulders were squared, and even alone, he looked taller than when he’d arrived.

I picked up the document and my eyes burned. He’d known. Maybe for a long time.

He’d already done the work – gathered the proof, found the loophole, built me a way out. That proud, stubborn man had found a way to set me free without making either of us beg.

Silas wrapped himself around me from behind, his chin hooked over my shoulder, his ears brushing soft against my cheek. His voice was low.

“Do you regret it? Choosing me?” A beat. “I don’t have money. I’m not exactly respectable.”

I turned in his arms, took his face in my hands, and looked into those eyes – still half-feral, still full of fight, and so full of love it almost hurt.

I smiled.

“Silas, do you remember? That boy in the cage who told me, ‘Whoever breaks it is a pathetic

little mutt.”

“He gave me the only thing that mattered – a reason to keep going.”

I pressed my lips to the corner of his mouth.

“You kept me alive back then. Now it’s my turn.”

“Welcome home.”

Outside, the rain had stopped. Moonlight broke through the clouds.

Silas’s tail swept around me one more time – wide, joyful, unashamed – pulling me into the

warmth of him.

No more pretending. No more missing what had been right in front of us.

The road ahead was long. But for the first time, I wasn’t walking it alone.