Page 42 of Kneel with the King
I don’t answer.
Behind us, I hear footsteps.
I don’t have to turn around. I know who it is. Ava says nothing. Just pats my arm once—warm, intentional, perhaps even pitying—and slips away with that eerie grace of hers to clean up the yoga mats.
King steps up beside me. “Are you okay?”
His voice is neutral. Not prying. But I turn anyway, surprised.
He’s watching me with the kind of expression I’ve never seen on him before—open, curious… like he’s offering me something by asking.
I shouldn’t answer.
I don’t owe him anything.
But something in my chest cracks open sideways, and the words spill out.
“Yes and no,” I say, voice rough.
“Because of Ava?”
I shrug. “Ari and I were together for two years. I thought she was going to be it. I expected her to be it, even though I realize now that I always kept her at a distance. Never let myself get too close.”
King stays still, listening.
“She left me for my twin brother. Then, they got married and had a baby.” I pause. “And do you want to know the worst part?” I ask, breath stuttering. “I can’t even blame her. He’s the guy she wanted in the end. And I was just some kind of… insurance policy. The safe bet. Theeasyone.”
King doesn’t respond right away, and I take a few steadying breaths.
“Did they lie to you?” he asks eventually.
“No,” I say. “Not really. They just… didn’t let me see what was happening until it was already done.”
“You speak like someone who thinks you deserved what happened.” I freeze, and he turns to look at me. His dark eyes are steady, and his voice is quiet as he delivers his next line. “You didn’t.”
And just like that, the knot in my chest loosens by a fraction.
“Is that why you haven’t mentioned him? Your brother? I get the feeling there’s bad blood between the two of you.”
I huff a laugh. “You could say that. But no, that’s not why.” I can feel King’s eyes on the side of my face, burning into me as he waits for me to elaborate. “It goes back further than that. He had a wife and daughter who died, and he turned into someone I didn’t recognize. I was too busy with my life to see how much he was unraveling. I said some things I can’t take back. And then he…” I look away.
“One time, when I was really drunk, I was out at a local bar. I was with someone I shouldn’t have been with, and he saw. He saw everything. He tried to talk to me, but I shut him down. It got physical. Two months later, he was arrested, and I didn’t see him for twenty years.”
King blows out a long breath of air. “Sounds intense.”
I nod. “Yeah. Things are a little better now. We text sometimes—there’s even a joke or funny meme thrown in from time to time. But it’ll probably never be how it once was.”
“And you blame yourself?”
“Yeah. Maybe if I’d been there for him, he wouldn’t have gone rogue. He wouldn’t have done what he did, you know?”
“Do you believe in fate?” he asks, and the question catches me off guard.
“No. Do you?”
King gives me a tight smile. “Kind of. Sometimes. So, take this with a grain of salt. But maybe it was all supposed to happen the way it did for Ari and—” He pauses.
“Maddox,” I supply.
