Page 183 of Feed Your Fiends

“I gave it to my brother.”

My heart flutters at the sound of the word tumbling so easily from his lips without the sting of ‘bastard’attached.

“Brother. You say it so comfortably now.”

“Hale’s always been my brother. I’ve always loved him.”

My chest tightens and aches with happiness for Hale. “I wish Hale could overhear you. He needs to hear it as much as he needs to feel it.”

He pulls back to peer down into my eyes. “I wish you would feel it when I tell you I love you.”

A ball knots in my throat, and suddenly, I feel as fragile as glass in his arms and equally transparent.

“I do believe you.” At his prompting gaze, I turn to the crowd where I know Hale is sitting, though I can’t see him.

There’s no one sitting in the crowd for me. Jaime hadn’t tried to contact me. I didn’t want her to, and I wouldn’t have answered if she had. But I hadn’t blocked her, and the sting of knowing she never tried still pangs through me.

“Sometimes it’s hard to accept, to understand that someone chooses to love you when those that should don’t.”

“I’ve chosen you from the start,” he says, his fingers tightening against my ribs as he sways us to the melody drifting from the stage as Rin and Sylo continue their perfect performance. “It’s the only decision I’ve never had to think about. Close your eyes.”

“What—”

“Close them,” he commands and my eyelids flutter shut without resistance at that cool, deep tone that makes me so fucking willing all the time. “I want you to see my fairytale.”

My eyelashes dust my cheeks as the world fades away and the music quiets to a soft echo.

“We dance all over the world, in every theatre. Whether they’re acclaimed or holes in the walls. So long as we’re on stage and together.”

“That’s if we got into a company,” I mutter, but the words feel hollow. I’ll get into a company. We’ll get into a company. Haven’t the past few months shown me that we can do anything?

“I already have a company in mind. My mother’s,” he says, his lips brushing my ear. “We still have to audition, of course.”

I pop an eye open. “Hale signed over the company to you? Even though he could use it for his new business? One the Beaumonts can’t cringe at?”

“He said it was never his to begin with. He handed me the keys and signed off on all the paperwork as easily as I handed him the keys to the penthouse. Unlike me, he has good memories filled with Marisol there. Our memories were mostly attached to the dance studio.”

I nod slowly in understanding.

“Close your eyes, dovey.”

I oblige, one eyelid at a time, which makes him smile. The whole world stops when he smiles at me.

“We audition for Marisol’s company because it won’t technically be mine for a few years. We dance the world. Then we return to… Where do you want your castle to be?”

My thoughts swirl, but then, through the mist, comes the clearest depiction.

“An estate like the Parrish’s.” Delphine was still missing. Still a piece of shit. But her taste is impeccable. “The high-rises are beautiful but—”

“You don’t have to justify why you like anything to me. You love what you love, it’s why you’re with me. So if it’s the Parrish estate you want, you’ll have it. Done. We’re at the Parrish’s estate, renamed the Auclairs.”

“Wait!” I try to pull back to peer up at him, but he locks me in place.Auclair estate?!“I didn’t say I want the Parrish estate specifically, I said-”

“I saw the way you looked at it. Like it was a fairytale. A dream. It’s the same way you looked at Beaulieu when you first arrived.”

I shake my head. “Gant! It’s Silas and Sylo’s home, maybe even Hale’s—”

“Hale will never be welcomed there so long as Silas owns it,” he cuts me off. “And I want him to be welcome there because it’s all he wants. To be accepted by his blood. So I’ll be the one to bloody welcome him.”

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