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“I do not know what made you believe that,” King said, “but this is different.”
“Tell me why,” I demanded.
“You must know.” His already acerbic gaze grew more severe.
“King, I’m too fucking tired and emotionally fried to play your read-between-the-lines game.”
He remained silent.
“Fine. But if you don’t have any evidence that I’m Hagne, then you’ll be ending my life based on the word of those conniving Seers, and that’s a pretty shitty thing to do, especially considering my feelings for you and that I had your baby.”
“See, you do know.”
“Know what?” I snapped.
“You have feelings.”
“So what?” I asked.
“Yet you cannot explain them, correct?”
“Yes, but—”
“You risked everything to save me from Sage,” he added. “You even made a deal with Ansin to do it.”
“Yes, King, but that doesn’t make me some crazy baby killer.”
“Hagne was my betrothed before I met Mia. I cared for her but did not love her. She, on the other hand, had bigger ambitions of power and ruling. She would have done anything to marry me. Anything at all. Just as long as I did not turn my back on her. Which I did. Twice. And twice I paid the price.”
I never got the full story, but I knew enough. At one point, before I was born, King had used a chalice to bring back the most powerful Seers, including Hagne. His plan was to use them as his supernatural henchwomen to keep Ten Club members in check. I didn’t know how he intended to make them loyal, but obviously that failed.
The moment he decided to end Ten Club, the Seers rose up to take it for themselves. King wasn’t having it. Only a few got away from the massacre, Hagne being one. She took her revenge before King got to her.
“You’ve proven my point,” I said. “I fell in love with you before I even knew who you were. And when we finally figured out the truth about your past, you basically kicked me to the curb. While I was pregnant,” I added. “But I never went after you. In fact, despite being heartbroken, all I wanted was to help you find your way back to your family.”
He had no idea how hard that was.
“Your actions defy logic. Just like Hagne.”
“Oh God.” I rolled my eyes. “So, basically, my lack of wanting to hurt you proves I’m Hagne, when you just said she always took revenge?” This made no sense.
“I’m saying that no woman would endure the pain I caused you if she did not feel a much deeper connection—something built over time.”
So this was his proof? He believed our relationship went way back? Stupid.
“I get why you might be suspicious of me,” I said, “but you’re forgetting a very important point: You saved my life that first night we met. And then you changed it. Do you have any clue what things were like before you popped out of the fucking metal box on the beach?”
He waited for me to elaborate.
“I was a doormat, King. People treated me like shit because I couldn’t stand up for myself. I could hardly speak above a whisper, if I spoke at all. I was terrified of my own shadow.”
“And?”
“And why wouldn’t I have feelings for the person who changed all that?” I refrained from talking about how beautiful he was or how sleeping with him was unlike anything I’d experienced. He’d devoured me whole and left me aching so deeply I thought I’d lose my mind if I didn’t have him again.
“Do not do that.”
“You’re in my head again?” I snapped, not at all happy about it, but also unsurprised.
He shrugged. “My abilities come and go.”
“Then read my mind, dig as deep as you’d like, King. You won’t find Hagne here.”
He shook his head. He wasn’t buying my argument.
“Why won’t you believe me?” I growled. “I don’t want to hurt you or your family. I don’t want to hurt anyone.” Maybe that wasn’t true. I wanted to hurt whoever took my child.
“I care for you.”
I blinked. “Sorry?”
“Not love, but care. That is your answer.”
It was nice to hear, I supposed, but…“Okay. So…?”
“And that feeling is familiar.”
The lightbulb came on. His belief that I was Hagne had nothing to do with me. It was him. His feelings. “That doesn’t prove anything. I was there for you when you had no clue who you were or what happened to make you so angry.”
“I had to force you to help me.”
“True, but I still did it.” I could tell from his stern gaze I wasn’t winning him over. “Fine. Let’s say you’re right. I am Hagne, a powerful, evil, cunning bitch who’s been obsessed with you for thousands of years. Let’s say I did all these massively fucked-up things. But what about you, King? How many lives have you destroyed? How many people have you killed? How many children, women, men have suffered at the hands of your Ten Club members?” I leaned forward, staring him down. “How many little girls grew up without a mother, like I did?” He knew what he’d done, and it wasn’t only my life he’d fucked up. My father had been heartbroken, too.
