Page 67 of The Daughters of Nyx

A shaky breath passed my lips as I shook my head. “I just feel so…stupid, for one.”

“Why?”

I looked down at our pastel plates that looked mismatched but were all carefully chosen from different thrift stores around the city to fit some whimsical-witchy vibe we’d wanted during college. The days spent searching for theperfectkitchenware felt like an entire lifetime ago.

“I feel stupid for liking Adrian and Rowan, knowing what I know now,” I finally replied, struggling to hold myself together. “I feel stupid for letting myself be vulnerable with Adrian, because for him, it was work.”

Thea made a sound in the back of her throat. “That is not on you.Youdid nothing wrong.” She took my hand and gave it a squeeze. “He—they—broke your trust. You saw the best in them, and there is nothing wrong with that.”

I blew out a breath. “I don’t know how to come back from that.”

“I know.” Her hand squeezed mine again. “What you need to do is first, work out this wholeQueen of the Supernatural Racething,thendecide how you feel about him—romantically, platonically, evilly. But priority one is this Queen business, yeah?”

I nodded, grateful for my best friend and her ability to read me like an open book. For her ability to talk to me and break down all the negativity drowning me.

“I think our first priority is technically work,” I muttered. “And somehow dealing with Kerry.”

I’d finally replied to her last night with an adequate response: I would attend dinner with Thea and Elias at my side. Of course, she’d been ecstatic and claimed sheknewwe hadn’t broken up. That I’d be stupid to give up someone as handsome as Elias.

Not even telling her I’d broken up with my supposed boyfriend was enough to get me off the hook.

Thea groaned and threw her head back. “If one of those supes killed me now, I’d be thankful, not gonna lie.”

I snickered and whacked her on the arm. “Hush, you.”

“You really want to deal with Kerry?” Thea asked, lifting a perfectly plucked brow.

I shook my head. “I think I’d rather have hellhounds tear me apart slowly.”

My best friend grinned. “Oh, how I love dinners with your mother.”

~

The car ride home was eerily silent. Thea and I were tucked into the back seat with Adrian again, Rowan forced into the very back, though he didn’t seem inclined to use the seat belt as he rested his forearms on the back of my seat. If I so much as leaned my head back, I would have felt his breath on the back of my head, and his warm skin against my neck.

We made it to my home town, Blakeview, with fifteen minutes to spare. Fifteen minutes to stew in my anxiety as I prepared for the next two hours of hell.

“Are you okay?” Adrian asked, lowering his voice as Maeve navigated her way to the edge of town, where my childhood home sat.

I shrugged. “I’m sort of used to this now.”

Adrian grimaced, and gave my knee a squeeze. “Really that bad?”

I didn’t want to explain to him the torture Kerry put me through growing up. Not literal torture, but the emotional kind; commenting on my weight and telling me the reason I couldn’t land a steady relationship was because I wasn’t working on myself. The days where she would beat me down with her cruel words masked as advice before leaving me with three kids who didn’t see me as their older sister, but as their babysitter.

Kerry never hit me. Her abuse was different. It was dieting from the age of ten and ‘working out’ with her and some of the other moms who lived down our street. It was shaming me under the guise of wanting me to be healthy, and it came back occasionally now that I was out of the house and not in her presence as much. She’d toned it down in the last few years I

was under her roof, but I’d be damned if I let her shame me in front of the supes—or the kids, who were probably falling for all her health bullshit.

I lifted my chin and offered Adrian a smile. “I can handle her. I’m more worried about Elias. All the attention is going to be on him.”

He grunted in response. “I know how to handle your mother.”

Rolling my eyes, I shook my head. “I doubt it. But good luck.”

I spared Adrian a look from the corner of my eye, and found him watching me with a strange look. “I know you can handle it,” he murmured. “But you have people who can help you. Just remember that you can leave whenever you want.” His eyes searched mine, and for a moment, I could almost hear what he wasn’t saying aloud:if you feel the magic, get out.

Swallowing, I nodded, and the smile slipped from my face.

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