TABOO A DEAL WITH THE SHADOW ALPHA

ADDISON

The polished marble floor of my parents' dining room felt like ice under my feet. I pushed a piece of meat around my fancy plate, the quiet so thick you could hear the clock ticking in the hallway. I had to tell them, and I had to do it now. There was never a good time, but with the whole family here for Sunday dinner, it felt like now or never.

I put my fork down. The sound was too loud and I knew with the next words I was about to cause a massive explosion, but I was hear to bare it that live in torture with that bastard. "Mom, Dad... I broke up with Feign."

The clinking of silverware stopped dead, I swallowed down, not just the food but my fear of what their reaction would be. I swayed my legs beneath the table anxiously, thinking of what mom might say next. My mother's head snapped up. Her eyes, the same color as mine but always so much colder, turned narrow. "You broke up with Feign?" she asked, her voice too calm. Mom's voice was always calm; she never raised her voice, not under any circumstance. It was always what she taught me and my siblings to keep calm and collected no matter what, showing any other emotion was a sign of weakness and vulnerability. Even as kids we weren't allowed to get scared, whether of spiders or even the darkness we had to face everything head on regardless. Children of the Amber-white's family were never afraid of anything but beneath the cold exterior we all had one fear, Our Mother.

My heart was pounding. "Yes. It... we just weren't working out. He was too controlling, Mom." My voice pitched higher than I expected it to be, cutting through the silence, causing the heads of everyone to turn in my direction, including the servants.

"Don't you dare raise your voice at my wife, Addison," my dad grumbled from the other end of the long table, not even looking up from his steak. Same as always. Jumping to her defense, never listening to me. He only truly cared about one person his wife, their love was something I could never still understand in my 27 years of living, dad never said much to us, he only scolded us when ever we said or did something that could potentially hurt our mother, as much as some of us thought it was cute, it was also really annoying.

My mother placed her fork down perfectly. "Who gave you permission to do that?" she asked.

The question was so crazy it almost made me laugh. Almost. "Permission? Ma, it's my life! We weren't happy! He was suffocating me!"

"You will get back with him," my mother said, like I was a child who'd said no to broccoli. She took another slow bite, her face not showing even a glint of emotion. "Do you have any idea what your relationship with him