Mated To My Obsessive Stepbrother novel Chapter 16

Chapter 16

KASMINE.

I dropped to my knees beside the bed, staring at the pile of my belongings with a mix of horror and confusion. My mind raced, searching for an explanation, but there was none. None that made sense.

Kester… my brother… had kept all these things. He’d taken them.

I felt sick. My chest tightened, and the room seemed to spin around me.

My hands were still trembling when I noticed a book. It had fallen out of the box, landing near my feet. The leather–bound cover was worn, its edges frayed as though it had been handled countless times. A diary.

I stared at it for what felt like an eternity, my pulse hammering in my ears. Fear clawed at my insides, twisting and tightening until I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t want to pick it up. Whatever was inside that diary, I knew it wouldn’t make anything better. It would make it

worse. So much worse.

But I couldn’t leave it untouched. Not after everything I’d already uncovered.

My fingers hesitated before finally reaching for it. Slowly, I opened it to the first page.

My name stared back at me, written in Kester’s familiar handwriting.

MINE.

I flipped to the next page, my fingers trembling so hard I nearly tore it.

“I took the ribbon she wore today. She looked so perfect in it. I couldn’t help myself. It still smells like her. I kept it in my box. My secret. She can never know.”

My heart stopped. The ribbon. I thought I’d lost it years ago.

I slapped the book shut, squeezing my eyes closed as my breathing grew ragged. My hands clenched the diary so tightly that my knuckles turned white.

No. No, this couldn’t be real.

But it was.

I forced my eyes open and turned another page. This time, there was a crude drawing–of me. My face, my hair, and my smile were sketched with an almost obsessive level of detail.

“I don’t know when it began, this maddening fixation on her smile. It’s as if the world stops when she laughs, and I am the only one lucky enough to hear it. She’s sunlight in a world that

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“I know it’s wrong. Gods, I know it. But how can something that feels so real, so consuming, be wrong? I can’t stop thinking about her. The way her hair falls, the way she looks at me without knowing what I see in her eyes. She’s too close and yet untouchable.”