Page 34 of Silent Secrets

Kai

Father: I’m coming to the palace tonight and so are the others’ parents. We all need to sit down and have a talk about this girl. We’ll be there for dinner.

I frown at the message from my father. I don’t want to see him or any of the guys’ parents. The drama that they bring is something I don’t want to deal with, but then again, I never do. I honestly just wish that my father would forget that I exist, but I know that will never happen.

If he forgets I exist, how can he tell me what a disappointment I am? How I’ll never live up to Ryder’s memory. How he wishes Ryder was here and not me. How I wouldn’t even have been born if it hadn’t been for my brother’s disappearance. How my mother would be alive if it weren’t for me.

I can’t do anything right in his eyes and I know that he’s never loved me—I’m nothing more than a replacement heir to him. He’s never treated me as anything more than that. I wonder if my mother at least loved me—or did she resent me, too? That’s one question that I’ll never have the answer to, seeing as I never even had the chance to know her. She died within a week of my birth, some missed complications that no one caught in time.

I wonder if he’ll be bringing his new wife. I roll my eyes at the thought of Bella. She and my father have been married for six months and she’s already pregnant. Which isn’t a big deal—I’d be happy to have a younger sibling, but I know that my father and Bella will poison them against me.

Bella doesn’t like me because she sees me as a threat to her child. But there’s no way that her child will be the Duke of the Autumn Court unless I die before I have a child myself. Though I wouldn’t put it past her to kill me. No, that’s mean. She wouldn’t kill me herself. She’d use my father’s money to have someone else kill me.

The worst part of it all? Bella is younger than me. She married my father just after her twenty-first birthday, because he had to be sure that her magic was strong enough before he went through with the vows. Yes, that’s right, my stepmother is three years younger than me. I’m sure that it’s every Fae’s fantasy to have a hot young stepmother—except mine. Especially since she’s a scheming bitch.

Glancing at the time, I see that I only have about ten minutes until I need to meet Hadley for her lessons. The thought brings a smile to my face, the dread that has been building in me giving way to excitement tinged with nervousness.

At lunch, Caiden had told me what had happened in her lesson, how upset she’d been. Last night changed a lot of things for us—especially me. We’ve only known Hadley for a few days, but suddenly she’s taking up most of my thoughts. I’ve never felt like this for someone so quickly. Hell, Caiden’s the only other person I’ve ever felt attracted to.

Being so much younger than the other three heirs has always been hard on me—especially since I came in to replace my missing brother, who’d been their best friend for years. But they’d taken me under their wing and treated me like a little brother. Which had been fine until I hit my teen years and I’d developed the biggest crush on Caiden.

I’d never thought that I stood a chance with him, seeing as he’d seen me grow up and he’s never had a problem finding anyone to sleep with. So I’d hidden my crush the best that I could for years and he became my best friend. I knew that would have to be enough for me, or at least that’s what I’d thought.

Everything had changed between us the night before my twenty-first birthday. I’ve had issues with anxiety since I was young—thanks to my ever so loving father—so the guys were used to it and often knew how to calm me down. But the night before my magic was to reveal itself, my father had beaten the shit out of me after telling me how worthless I was and that he knew my magic would be weak. I would embarrass him and our family line. I would never be good enough.

Well, he said a lot of things—things that I regularly have to remind myself aren’t true. But that night? I hadn’t been able to get his words out of my mind, and I was spiraling. Caiden found me on the roof of my father’s house, drunk and considering doing something that I couldn’t take back. Something that would’ve caused irreparable damage to my friends. Something that I couldn’t have come back from—ever.

He saved me that night—he saved me with his words, telling me how amazing I was and how he couldn’t survive without me. He’d cried when he’d told me that losing me would be even harder than losing my brother had been. And then he’d kissed me.

We still have to hide our relationship, because technically it’s against the law, but that’s not the only reason. As the heirs to the dukedoms of our courts, we’ll be required to father at least one child, which we cannot do with another man. Or at least that’s what my father had screamed in my face after he found us together just a few weeks after that first kiss.

We’d told him that it was a one-time thing, that we’d been curious. I don’t know if he’d believed us—he’d still beaten the shit out of me again when Caiden had left—but he’s never mentioned it since that night. But that had also been the last night that I’d lived under his roof. Caiden, Hunter, and Marcos had shown up at my door the next day and informed me that the four of us were getting a place together in Natsu, where we’ve lived ever since.

Neither Hunter nor I get along with our parents. Caiden and Marcos’s parents are much more supportive of their sons, though they still expect more than they should. For example, wanting us to get rid of Hadley. I hadn’t realized that all of our parents were so power-hungry.

That’s not completely true. I knew mine and Hunter’s parents were—it’s obviously an Unseelie trait—but I didn’t think that Caiden’s and Marcos’s parents would demand the same of them. I have a feeling that my father had a part in convincing them that this was the right path.

The day before Grace had retrieved Hadley, our parents had pulled us together and told us they expected us to get rid of her. To do whatever we needed to in order to make sure that she never takes the throne. The fact that they want a meeting now, when she’s been here for less than a week, is concerning. What do they expect us to have been able to do in that amount of time?

Pushing away thoughts of my asshole father, I stand up and make my way to the drawing room where I’ll get to see Hadley. Thinking of Hadley makes my mind go back to the night before again. I don’t know what came over me in that library, but I don’t regret it. I don’t regret the hunger I saw in Hadley’s eyes when she watched Caiden suck on my dick. I don’t regret the way those hungry eyes turned to me when I’d told Marcos to check how wet she was. I don’t regret watching the way Marcos had fucked that pretty pink pussy with his fingers—though I wish it had been my fingers sliding in and out of her, soaked in her juices.

I clear my throat, glancing around before adjusting myself in my pants. I’m already hard just remembering last night. Here’s to hoping I can keep my dick under control when I’m in the same room as her. The last time my dick had been constantly hard was when I was a teenager and couldn’t control it anytime I was around Caiden—not a time I wish to relive, mind you.

Still lost in my thoughts, I reach for the door without looking and hit skin instead of the doorknob like I expected. Sparks run up my arm from the touch, my eyes jumping up to find Hadley staring at me with wide eyes.

“Hi.” My voice is soft while I give her a shy smile, fighting to not duck my head. I don’t want her to think I regret the night before—I don’t want her to regret it.

“Hey, Kai.”

We stand there for a moment, neither of us moving as I stroke my fingers over her arm. Her eyes dart to my lips and when she licks her own, I can’t help but follow the movement.

I don’t even realize that I’m leaning in towards her until I hear someone clearing their throat. We jerk apart, my face flushing as I spin around to find Caiden smirking as he leans against the wall, eyebrows raised.

I blow out my breath, running my hand over my face as I shake my head. “What do you want, asshole?”

“Asshole?” Caiden clutches at his chest, mouth gaping open as if he’s offended—I know he’s not. “Addy, did you hear what he just called me?”

Hadley giggles and when I glance down at her, I find her eyes already on me as she chews on her lip—a habit that I’ve noticed she does too often. We’ll need to work on that. I can’t stand to see her lip abused repeatedly. She leans in close to me and whispers loud enough that I know she wants Caiden to hear, “He is kind of an asshole, huh?”

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