Page 45 of Conflicted Fate
“Seewhat?” I growled, starting to get irritated with him.
“Not so long ago, I told you something about myself,” he said, turning his head at last, his gaze grabbing mine in an intense exchange. “I told you who I really was. My real name, my past. It’s not an easy thing to swallow, and I expected you to disown me. Instead, you didn’t give a damn. You actually yelled at me to tell me thatI’m wrongabout who I am. You didn’t even give it a second thought!”
I shook my head, hair flying. “You’re wrong.”
He arched his eyebrows. “Oh, am I?”
“Yes. I gave it plenty of second thought. Lots andlotsof further thought.”
“And you still told me I was wrong.”
“Of course I did,” I said. “But I’d had plenty of time to see who you really were. To realize you weren’t the person who …”
Kiel looked at me intensely. He was trying to drive home his point, using what I'd said. I replayed my last words.
“Oh,” I said as it sank in, becoming clear as day.
“You’ve had decades to do that with your mother, Jada. Years and years to see your mother isn’t the evil person you’re making her out to be,” he chided. “You know better, but you’re choosing to ignore it.”
“Because she activelyliedto me,” I pointed out.
“So did I!” he cried, throwing his hands in the air.
“It’s different.”
“It’s not.”
“Yes, it is. You lied about yourself. Sort of. You never really said youweren’thim, and besides, there were hints about your past. Things you could do. There was evidence to prove you weren’t telling us everything about yourself.”
He shook his head, ready to continue his argument, but I beat him too it.
“Kiel, she lied aboutme. She hid who I was and why I even exist. That’s a bit different.”
“No, it’s not,” he said firmly. “You’re twisting it. Accept it andmove on. That's your mother, and if you think she doesn’t love you like any other mother, then you're nowhere near as smart as I thought you were.”
I leaned back. “That’s kind of harsh, don’t you think?”
“A bit hypocritical to be saying that when you’re currently cutting out your mother, don’t you think?” he challenged.
“Why are you being like this?” I asked, hurt. “I thought you and I were … a whatever we are. A thing.”
“That’swhyI’m pushing you like this!” he half-shouted. “Don’t let your ego blind you to the fact that I’m trying tohelp youby telling you that you’re overreacting.”
I froze, taken aback by his outburst. It was so unlike Kiel that I needed a moment to process what he was saying and how he was saying it. Was I letting my ego, or any other part of myself for that matter, blind me?
“I can’t just forget,” I said. “You can’t ask me to do that. Shedidlie, Kiel. No matter what you say. No matter how serious you say it is or isn’t, shedidlie.”
“As if parents are perfect,” he said. “Did youneverlie to her? Never try to hide actions you regretted and hoped she wouldn’t find out about?”
A memory swam up of a broken window and cutting a branch off thefilmoretree as a scapegoat instead of the angrily thrown book that had caused the damage.
“Maybe,” I said, looking anywhere but at him.
“We’ve got to go deal withthis,” he said, waving a hand broadly at the Wulfhere army. “Before we do,set things right with her. Trust me, if you don’t, you’ll regret it. Especially if it doesn’t work out. Don’t let whatever you told her be the last thing you said to her.”
I leaned heavily against the wall, considering the callout I’d just received at the hands of my man.
“There,” Kiel said, pointing into the distance and gracing me with a change of subject. “See that banner? The one with the red stripe.”
