"Domenic...."

Emily's barely audible voice brought Domenic out of his thoughts as his attention turned towards his little sister who was sitting upright on her bed.

He did not waste even a single second before he stood up from his seat beside the floor-to-ceiling length glass window and hurried towards his baby sister.

It was half-past five in the early morning and the house was filled with silence, even though he was sure that almost all of his brothers were awake in their bedrooms.

And if his guess was right then Leo, Crist, and Simon were all present in Leo's bedroom that was the closest room to Emily's bedroom.

"What's wrong?" He gently asked as he took a seat beside her on the edge of the bed.

Emily looked at her eldest brother in silence as he watched her with his warm and tender eyes, and that was probably how she finally lost her control.

Even before she could realize what she was doing, she found herself snuggled into Domenic's arms as she started bawling like a child.

"Emilia? Sweetheart, what's wrong? Are you in pain? Do you want me to call Sam?" Domenic hurriedly asked as panic started rising in his heart after seeing her current condition.

In reply, her hands only tightened around his waist as she snuggled closer into his embrace. Still crying her heart out.

Domenic could do nothing but to pull his little sister into his lap as he cradled her tightly into his embrace, rubbing her head as he rocked her lightly.

"It's okay, Emmy. I'm here, honey. Your brother is here. Don't cry." Domenic whispered softly to his baby sister as he kept rubbing soothing circles on her back.

He had no idea how long they sat there like this and how long it took before Emily finally stopped crying, only soft and small hiccups could be heard escaping her lips.

Domenic picked up the glass of water from the bedside table and brought it closer to Emily's lips.

The little girl didn't hesitate before she took the glass in her hands and finished its entire content in one go.

Domenic placed the empty glass back on the table as he opened a packet of tissue paper and softly started drying the tears that were still visible on Emily's face.

It was not until his gentle actions once again brought tears into her eyes, that he stopped.

He observed the puffy red eyes and similarly appearing red nose and cheeks of his baby sister, who was clutching his hand tightly in her smaller ones while she stared at the bowl of cold medicine that was sitting on the bedside table.

"I almost forgot. You need to finish it and there are no excuses for it being bitter. I'll give you....."

"I'm sorry, Nick."

Emily blurted out before Domenic could finish his line.

Only God knew exactly how much guilty she was feeling at that moment. She just wanted to disappear and never create any more problems for anyone else, especially for her brothers.

"We will talk about this later. You need to rest and give your body and mind a break." Domenic softly said as he reached to pick up the bowl of medicine.

However, his hand stopped in its track as his ears registered Emily's next words.

"I heard everything."

Her voice was so soft that it almost felt like that he was imagining those words.

"What are you talking about, Emilia? What did you hear?" Domenic asked as a frown appeared on his handsome face.

Emily turned to look right into her brother's familiar green eyes which were patiently waiting for her explanation.

Her hands tightly closed around his large hand as she answered, "In the car. On our way back here. I heard everything that Mark said."

The room was suddenly covered with a thick blanket of silence as both brother and sister sat there, lost in their own thoughts.

##

[Flashback.....]

It was a coincidence that Emily regained her consciousness in the car and found herself sleeping in Simon's arms.

Since her face was snuggled against his oversize coat and the inside of the car was mostly filled with darkness, no one realized that she was awake.

She would have ended up falling asleep immediately again if her ears had not picked up on Mark's words.

".....I don't know why you guys are being so lenient with her. If we did not make her understand that what she did today was utterly stupid and dangerous, she's gonna create even more troubles in the future."

The anger and frustration were clear in his voice and it felt like he was doing his very best to not shout.

"Mark! Just enough! We know that what she did is going to create troubles between us and Sullivans, but you keep forgetting that she's not aware of the pact between the three families."

It was Crist who replied and he too did not sound happy about arguing with his brother.

He sounded tired, they all did, to be honest, and it only increased her sadness as she realized that she was probably the reason behind their tired states.

"So what? Just because she's not aware of the problems between the Sullivans and us, are we going to let her do as she wishes?" Mark asked as he looked at his brothers with shocked eyes.

Emily could tell that both Leo and Domenic were not in the car, as well as Sam and Jackson and it probably was a good thing for Mark.

"It's not that, bro. She's clearly aware of the problems between the two families and we are not trying to cover that part up of her faults. What Crist is trying to say is that she was not aware about the casualties of crossing that damn stream!"

Emily shut her eyes tightly as she felt Simon barking out loudly at Mark in order to put some sense in his stupid brother's over-stupid brain.

"Why did she even crossed that stream?" It was Daniel's voice that traveled through the momentary silence that had descended after Simon's outburst.

Emily realized that he was sitting in the passenger seat, however, she could not see him at all.

She was afraid to move and alert her brothers. She wanted to hear and find out exactly how big of a trouble she had created.

"Now, there's nothing else we could do but to forget about summoning the council," Simon said with a sigh as his hands tightened around her a little.

"Of course, we have to do that. First, Rylan broke the rule by entering into our part of the city, and then Emily did the same thing by crossing that stream and entering into their territory. If we summon the council now, it only means that both Emily and Rylan will be punished for breaking such an important rule of the treaty. Moreover, who's gonna believe that these two stupid teenagers broke the same rule within the span of a few hours without them being linked to each other in some sort of way. God knows what kind of punishment we will receive for not keeping an underage in check. Domenic will face a hell of a time in there."

Mark's sharp and sarcastic words filled the car with silence, a silence that was threatening to submerge Emily's world into a deep abyss.

She bit down on her lower lip to stop the whimper that nearly made its way out of her mouth.

How could she have known that by crossing that stream she would cause such a huge problem for her brothers?

She still could not understand the actual problem between her brothers and the Sullivans.

She had no idea exactly what her brothers meant when they talked about the city being divided into two different territories.

She had next to no idea exactly who were the people who kidnapped her wanted from her.

Who was the guy who saved her and then disappeared?

What was the council and whom her brothers' were summoning?

She was confused about Rylan and the incidents that followed their meetings.

There were so many things that raised hundreds of unanswered questions in her mind.

However, at that moment, the only thing that mattered to her was that she had landed not only herself but her brothers too in a big problem.

A single tear made its way down her cheek, but she did not dare to move even a little bit.

She was totally submerged in the sea of guilt as she tried to not let more tears slid down her cheeks.

She wanted to curl around Simon and cry her heart out, to tell them all exactly how sorry she was.

But she did nothing like that. She just sat there in silence with her eyes closed and her hands lying on her lap as she waited for the darkness to once again pull her back into its world.

She felt one of Simon's hands curling around her shoulders and the other one drifting into her hair as he started patting her head softly.

For a moment, she thought that he was aware that she was awake but then she shook away the thought mentally.

There was no way he knew, right?

She was totally unaware that her brother was aware of her state. He had felt the coldness of her tear on his chest as it had dropped on his shirt and he knew that she was about to break anytime soon.