Page 18 of Kingdom of Betrayal and Unknown

And that scares me.

I’ve never felt a connection like this before. It almost rubs deep inside me, like it’s been lying dormant for my whole life, waiting to wake up and click into place.

“Kieran,” he finally answers, approaching me.

“Kieran what?” I push, wanting to know his full name.

“You don’t get to know that… yet. What’s your name, Sweets?” he asks. “Unless you want me to call you Sweets for the rest of your life. Maybe even if I know your name, I’ll still call you Sweets some of the time. It suits you.”

“Just some?” I cock my head to the left.

“Yes, just some. At first, I thought you were this sweet little thing, but you are feisty,” He growls. “I like that. I may have to come up with another name for when you’re being sassy.”

I roll my eyes.

“Now, name?”

“Adeline, but a lot of people call me Addie,” I ramble before I can stop myself. Why did I just tell him that?

I close my eyes for a couple of seconds and take a deep breath. It just fell out of me. I want to tell him everything. I want to get close to him and know everything about him.

But that’s wrong.

He’s Fae. A very handsome Fae at that. One I wouldn’t mind climbing like a tree and having my way with.

Stop.

I need to stop thinking like that, or else I’m going to do something I’m going to regret. I should be angry toward him and treat him like he’s beneath me.

“Adeline.” He tests out my name.

A shiver makes its way through my body, and I clench my jaw. Wrapping my arms around my stomach, I stop myself from taking a step closer to him as I feel the pull to be closer to him. I feel like my body is on fire when his voice dips with my name on his tongue.

Like it’s meant to be.

“Like that?” He smirks.

I scoff and turn around, heading back to the town. I did like it, though, and he knows it from the smirk across his face.

“You should stay,” he says before I make it five steps.

“No thanks, you’re here,” I call over my shoulder. But everything in me wants to stay and be around him. He has this air around him that makes me comfortable, pulls me toward him. What is it?

“Do you hate my kind?”

My whole body stills as I look over my shoulder at him. He is staring at me, like he is trying to find the answer.

How am I supposed to answer that? Do I lie so he will spare my life, or tell him the truth and potentially get killed? Though, Kieran said he wasn’t going to kill me.

“I don’t have to answer your question. You don’t deserve the answer.” I flinch as I say those words, immediately feeling guilty.

“I may not deserve the answer, but I think you want to tell me,” he gently says. “Maybe you need to say the words you so desperately have been trying to keep a secret.”

“You wish.” I scoff. “I don’t have to answer to you. I won’t answer you.”

I clench my jaw and force myself to breathe. Every word is like a punch to the gut. So much so, I wrap my arms around my waist once again, trying to ease the pain I’m feeling. He has done nothing to deserve my rudeness. Well, he did threaten me earlier, but then promised he wouldn’t hurt me.

He hasn’t hurt me… yet. I believe him when he said he wouldn’t. I believed when he said I was his world, but it doesn’t make sense. I don’t know him, and he doesn’t know me. How can I already be his world? We can never be together, not when he’s a slave and I’m a commoner. We’re two different things and two very different species.