Page 56 of Fake Fae-Ancée

I frowned down at the pan on the stove.

There was no reason to be jealous. But the sting wouldn’t go away. Kai and that Claudio-dude had always been thick as thieves. Too close for my and Bear’s taste. And even if he was married now, I still wondered, if there had ever been something going on between Kai and him.

"This looks good," she said when I finally served a stack of French toast. Her tone of surprise only fueled my pride. I started to clean up while she took up the fork and dug in, gobbling up the first piece of toast in just a few bites. I couldn’t help but chuckle.

"Whap? I’m humbgry," she muffled, her mouth full. "Ohmygob." She swallowed and stared at me. "This is delicious!"

"Well, thank you very much," I said, putting the dishes away. Did she like it just as much as the one I had made her this morning? Bates had been pretty disgruntled about me standing in the kitchen, only to make breakfast for "my acquaintance".

"This is beneath you, Your Royal Highness," he had complained, but I had been nervous about her staying here. About Nox and the entire clusterfuck we had found ourselves in. Food calmed Kai down, usually. And, more annoyingly, feeding her had always calmed me down. So I had made her some breakfast. Sue me.

"Why are you here?"

I turned, surprised to find her sitting on the counter next to the stove. She must have sneaked up there while I’d been cleaning.

"I live here?" I said, putting the towel away.

She scoffed. "You know what I mean. Why are you here? Why aren’t you back in Bear-town up north?"

My throat tightened like a thick rope.

"I told you all that when I came back," I said, my voice hoarser than I would have liked.

That wasn’t exactly true, but I had figured back then, the less Kai knew about what had happened to me, the better for her. Svalbard had taken a toll on me. Escaping from there had been nothing short of a miracle. Had it not been for Gabriel’s help, I probably would still be freezing to death in some dungeon.

"Wrong." The purple shimmer had returned into Kai’s eyes. "All I have ever gotten from you was half-baked excuses."

Bear whined. He hated her being angry at me. I took another step closer, crossing my arms.

"I explained what you needed to know." Even in my own ears it sounded like another one of my half-baked excuses.

Kai scoffed. "Yeah, and you decide what that is. Don’t you think your own wife would want to know why you and that floozy were eating each other’s faces off, all over the internet?"

Gods, Sankta Polina and the Elders! Why couldn’t she just let it be?

"It wasn’t like that!" I didn’t mean to shout, but Bear was fed up.

Kai didn’t even flinch. "You were married. And you kissed another woman. That’s what it looked like to me." Her words were flat.

I didn’t know what to answer. If I were in her shoes — busting her and Daemon-boy making out for instance, and Bear was ready to punch a hole in the wall at that thought alone — would I believe her? That it wasn’t what it looked like? Wasn’t like that?

Probably not.

But it hadn’t been what it looked like. I had been drunk. And overwhelmed by grief. Anastasia had kissed me before I could say anything. And before I knew it the story had been out there. But I would rather jump from a cliff before I told Kai that I had lost my kingdom, my honor and everything I held dear in only one day. I had disgraced the name of my family and everyone I held dear. And I’d rather live in a universe where Kai didn’t know that.

"Your story makes less and less sense," she said in a low voice. "Tell me the truth. What happened to you, Kalinin?"

"I told you it wasn’t like that,“ I growled, a large portion of Bear in my voice. "My word should be enough for you."

"Your word?" She gasped a laugh. "Are you nuts? You can’t even be honest to me about one simple thing. How can I trust your word?"

I darted forward. She tried to back away, but there was nowhere for her to go. I leaned in, propping my hands left and right from her on the counter, forcing her to crawl backwards on the chromed surface.

"You listen to me, woman," I growled, towering over her. "I never touched Princess Anastasia. Apart from that staged kiss you saw, that didn’t mean anything by the way, nothing ever happened."

I had told her all of that before. Countless times. But never had I been so angry as I was now.

Flushed, breathing hard, she stared back at me.

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