Page 52 of Devil May Hunt
“What are you doing?” Gunho asked.
“I’m going to order one of everything.”
He clicked his tongue and captured his hand, lowering it back to the table. After giving a slight shake of his head so the waiter would turn back around, he sighed. “Let’s not play any more of these games with them, all right?”
“Why, think I’m too childish?”
“No, I think they’re not worthy of you putting on a show for them. Besides, we don’t need their money or their influence. Are you forgetting who I am? Let’s do one better. I’ll refuse to let them pay. That will irk them, don’t you think?”
Brennon could picture the frown on his father’s face when he went to check the books and saw there’d been no charge for the night. His dad was like that. His ego got a stroke whenever he could flash his money around. They must have thought that would be enough to impress Gunho and make it so the alpha didn’t mind being blown off.
“So much for them secretly caring more about me than I thought.” Brennon downed the rest of his glass then reached for the bottle with his free hand, leaving his other trapped beneath the alpha’s large palm.
“I’m sorry. I fear that’s my fault, and I got your hopes up.”
“It’s fine. Who needs them.” Not Brennon. “I don’t need family.”
Gunho’s hand tightened over his. “You have family. We’re family.”
“Right.”
“Hey,” his firm tone caught Brennon’s attention, and he turned his head to look at the alpha. “We’re family.”
Sure, on paper that was very true.
“I have a new digital ID that says as much,” he joked, but the alpha didn’t laugh. “Royal Consort Brennon Cree. Interesting how much work it takes just to add another title before my name. I had to accidentally entice an alpha from another planet and—”
“Although I deserve it, I would prefer if you didn’t take out your irritation toward your parents on me.”
That was…fair. Brennon rubbed at his temple and then went back to staring out the window. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be. I know I haven’t done right by you. I know we started off…wrong. But I promise I’m trying to be what you need. You don’t have to pretend like their absence doesn’t hurt you.”
He knew all about doing the wrong thing and wanting forgiveness afterward. Hell, wasn’t it his fault his relationshipwith his parents had gotten this bad? If he’d only been open and honest with them all of those times, instead of purposefully not listening out of spite…But the past couldn’t be undone, and somewhere along the way, he’d gained a pushy, overly concerned for his well-being alpha.
“I don’t know how to be a family,” he admitted softly. “As you can see, I don’t have much experience with being a part of a healthy family dynamic.”
Gunho chuckled. “And I do?”
“You’re close with your cousins.” He remembered the alpha talking about them at length during one of their phone calls.
“We don’t want to kill each other, and they’re fine with having me around so long as I don’t step on their toes,” Gunho corrected. “I just didn’t want you to think I had no one in my corner and couldn’t protect you.”
“Protect me from what?” He glanced back at him. “You promised you wouldn’t try to force me to move planets.”
“I won’t. We’ll stay here.” The alpha cupped his cheek. “We’ll build a life here, together.”
“What, like wake up every morning and have breakfast before heading to the office?” Brennon scoffed. “How domestic.”
“You don’t approve?”
“It sounds a lot like how my parents have lived their lives the past twenty-plus years.”
“We’ll be different.”
“How so?”
“I don’t know,” Gunho admitted. “We just will.”
