AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I glance at Kane to find a sheepish smirk on his face, and despite the circumstances, I almost laugh.
It’s so unusual to see confident, dominating Kane put in his place like that. “Sorry, Lena. Go ahead.”
“I was just going to say… I’ve noticed you two looking at each other these past few days. I thought I was going crazy at first, but then it got harder and harder to ignore. It doesn’t seem like a fling to me. Which means it’s been going on for a long time. But it can’t have been going on for that long, can it? You’ve been ‘dead’ for three years… and three years ago Kelly was…”
“Of course it hasn’t been going on since she was seventeen,” Kane snaps. “She was a kid to me back then – damn-near invisible, so invisible I didn’t even recognize her when she arrived in Malta.”
He pauses and then glances at me with that same sheepish smirk. “No offense, Kelly. I might’ve gone a little overboard.”
“It’s okay. I know what you meant.”
I lift my hand to place it on his arm and then realize mid-move what I’m doing. Letting it drop, I shake my head, as though that can take back what I just almost did.
“Is anybody going to explain?” Lena snaps. “If you haven’t been talking for the last three years—”
“We haven’t,” I say. “I thought he was dead, just like you did.”
“But that makes no sense,” she says. “When did you start this, then? How long has it been going on?”
I glance at Kane. He’s wearing a polo shirt that shows how hard every part of him is, that shows his bulging muscles. His steel hair sparkles in the sunlight and dances on his grim-set jaw.
Then he smirks, letting out a short laugh. “When did you arrive in Malta?”
“Just over a week ago,” Lena says. “Why?”
Kane inclines his head. “Then you have your answer. That’s how long it’s been going on.”
“What?” Lena gasps. “So have I got it wrong? Is this just a fling?”
“No,” Kane growls firmly. “This is much, much more than that. Kelly and I are going to be together for the rest of our lives. We’re going to have a family together – she’s going to be the mother of your brothers and sisters, Lena.”
Lena sits back and lets out a long breath. “You two need to start making sense. How can any of that be true if this only started recently?”
I look at Kane and he looks at me, and then I arch my eyebrow. “Do you want to explain, or shall I?”
Lena grips the edge of the table and sits back, letting out a long breath as she shakes her head slowly. “So let me get this straight. You two fell for each other instantly, like the second you laid eyes on each other, just over a week ago?”
“Yes,” I murmur, waiting for the part where she turns vicious and hateful. And I wouldn’t even be able to blame her. She’d have every right. “When you put it like that, it sounds crazy…”
“That’s because it is crazy.” She laughs, but there’s a strange quality to it, almost like it could turn into a scream at any second. “This is just…”
I bite my lip and resist the urge to reach over and clasp onto Kane’s hand, squeezing down so I can try and feel some of his warmth and support, try and feel something to make any of this okay.
But then Lena laughs again, lighter this time.
“Dad, you’ll tell me the truth, won’t you?”
“Always,” Kane says firmly, his voice deep and confident. “I know I had to leave and I’m sorry for that, Lena. I’ll never stop being sorry for that. But that was to stop those monsters from hurting you.”
“But right now, if I ask you a question, you’ll be completely honest with me?” Lena stares hard at him, her expression firm like she’s going to say something very important. “Because I need to know. I need to be certain.”
“I promise, Lena.”
“Are you and Kelly in this for the long haul? Because that’s all that matters to me. Yeah, I won’t lie. I think it’s pretty shitty that you were sneaking around behind my back, that you kept this is a secret. But if it all happened so fast… and so much craziness has been going on. So I can sort of get it. But I need to know.”
“Forever,” Kane says, passion infusing his words, making my skin prick and tingle as warmth bubbles up inside of me. “I know it’s difficult to believe, but that’s the truth. I’m going to be with her for the rest of my life. We’re going to have a family together, all of us.”
Lena nods, neither smiling nor frowning. She’s approaching this with a calm I never could’ve foreseen. She faces me.
