It didn’t take a psychologist to sense all the underlying resentment that blossomed through the room. Father and son in a tense standoff.
“This is not a game.” Kieran’s aura flared around him, inciting Hunter to use his own. The hallways became a mix ofblue and green. “We raised you boys to understand that family comes before anything.”
Eva rushed into the hallway, her face drawn out compared to when I first met her. Gray’s mother was kind to me in a moment where my vulnerability couldn’t be suppressed. The unfettered affection signalled Erik had to be her child.
“Hunter.” Her voice broke as she said her son’s name. When her eyes flicked to me, I saw a glimmer of hope. “Quentin. Tell me you’ve spoken some sense into him. Tell me you’ve seen Grayson. Is he okay?”
In that instant, I was transported back to being thirteen. Some boys at school had teased me mercilessly, and I couldn’t process it all. After school, I took the bus to an old museum Dad had once taken us to and ignored my phone. When I walked through the door, Mum was livid. It soon melted away into tears and relief. It was the first time I realised how much Mum loved me and how selfish I had been. It didn’t matter how much trouble I gave my parents, their love was always unwavering. Even Mallory, who had given me up as a baby, had done so out of love.
Gray, in rare moments of vulnerability, had said he felt like the black sheep of his family. Placed between a protector and a lover, his powers always felt out of balance. He wondered how his family had put up with him and was quick to leave his parents’ home the moment he could. He believed he was too difficult to love. If only he knew the truth.
“No.” Hunter was blunt. “Quentin is here with me because we have some news to share.”
My stomach churned violently, and I curled my toes in my shoes in an attempt to ground myself. Hunter reached down and took my hand, and this time I didn’t struggle or tense.
“Quentin and I are engaged,” he announced.
“You’re what?” Kieran’s aura pulsed violently, portraying his anger.
“No.” Eva shook her head and focused on me. “No. No, you aren’t. You’re bound to Gray. My boy found his soulbound. You wouldn’t. You couldn’t.”
“What game are you playing, Hunter? How have you forced her into this?” Kieran approached him. “What sick and twisted?—”
“Don’t speak to him like that.” My voice came out with more strength than I thought I was capable of. I took a step forward, but Hunter’s aura appeared like a wall in front of me, stopping any further movement. “This was nothing to do with Hunter. It was a choice I made.”
Kieran narrowed his eyes. “I don’t believe that for a second.”
“Because I’m nothing more than a demigoddess? A pawn? A woman?”
His face fell. “I’ve never?—”
“Quentin.” My head turned to Eva. Beneath the facade, something shook and my free hand became a fist. The delicious bite of my nails sinking into the soft flesh of my palm kept me grounded. “Please. This can’t be true. Grayson is your soulbound.”
She kept saying it as if I didn’t understand the weight of our bond. But how could I forget it? How was I meant to forget the way Gray’s darkness had pulsed through my veins and pooled in my chest? The very essence of him was wound around every single cell. His name echoed with each beat of my heart. You didn’t forget those things. Didn’t throw them away carelessly. You planned as meticulously as you could and believed against all hope that you knew your bound better than anyone else.
“Grayson broke the bond,” I told her bluntly. “He made a choice and I’ve made mine. I’m not sure what you expected meto do, but I refuse to mope around after men who decide I am no longer worthy of them.”
The memory of Gray’s words stung. My heart was being held together by the most fragile threads and discussing his cruelty in any context left the organ on even more precarious footing.
“He…”
“He made a choice, Eva. Hunter saw something in me that Gray never did. And I’m grateful.” I glanced up at Hunter, who looked at me with veiled curiosity. “He’s seen my potential and my ambition. Something I’ve worked so hard for down on Earth. I know this is the right decision for me.”
When I looked back at Eva, her face had hardened. “You’d see Gray put to death?”
I bit the insides of my cheeks and tasted the familiar ferric tang. “Grayson is no longer my concern. And he has clarified that I am not his.”
Eva’s aura joined the colours in the room, but Kieran moved towards his wife. When he looked at me, I thought I might vomit across the floor. It was an intense look that held a mixture of disgust and hate.
“A lot of demigods proved they were untrustworthy, and I tried not to tar them all with the same brush. But you’ve proven to be the worst of them. Get out of our home.”
“I take it you won’t want an invitation to the wedding?” Hunter said, finally finding his voice.
“OUT!”
Hunter laughed as he dragged me out of the door and back onto the streets of lower Elysia.
My body felt numb. I wanted to run back inside and tell them the truth. That all of this was because of an impossible situation. That I would do anything I could to save Gray. That they would still lose a son and I was sorry they would have to go through that pain, but I had made my choice.
