35. Sina
The bike rolled to a stop in front of a small diner tucked behind a laundromat and a liquor store. We were definitely not in the Market District where all the tourists went. This was more for the locals, the kind of place you’d miss if you didn’t know it was here.
Kiron shut the engine off, bracing a foot on the ground as the bike settled.
He turned toward me, one hand coming up automatically to steady me as I swung my leg over and stood.
Before I could overthink it, I laced my fingers through his.
The heat of his palm soaked into my cold hands, and he gave me a small reassuring smile before leading me toward the front door.
The bell overhead chimed softly when we walked in. The smell of coffee and syrup hit me first, followed by the dull roar of people talking, forks clinking, plates shifting. A few heads turned our way. Eyes slid over me, then landed on him, and just as quickly dropped again.
I studied him from their perspective.
He was a biker, broad shouldered and towering over most of the room, dark and solid in a way that took up space without trying.
And it had nothing to do with the fact that he was a predator either.
It was just him. I could see why he made them uneasy.
I just didn’t feel that way. I couldn’t explain why. But I felt safe with Kiron.
The hostess led us to a booth in the back, quickly setting down our menus. “Your waitress will be right with you. Enjoy,” she said, then quickly disappeared.
“Scoot in.” Kiron gestured to the booth.
I slid in, and when he followed right beside me instead of across, I raised a brow in surprise. I’d expected him to take the seat opposite me like a normal person. Instead, his thigh brushed mine, his shoulder warm against my arm as he man-spread beside me .
I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye, pretending to study the menu.
Was this a date?
It felt like a date.
My stomach fluttered and my brain started listing all the reasons I should probably be more cautious around this vampire than I currently was.
Before I could spiral too far down that road, his hand slid over mine on the seat between us, fingers threading through mine with quiet certainty.
The contact was warm and steady, grounding.
My shoulders loosened before I even registered they’d been tight, my pulse settling like he’d turned down the volume on something inside me I didn’t know how to control.
“Order whatever you want. It’s on me.” He squeezed my hand once, before letting go.
I nodded, not trusting my voice for a second.
I hadn’t thought about grabbing my wallet when I left yesterday.
I’d been too busy spiraling about the flowers and Keith and running away from a past that suddenly felt way too close.
Heat crept up my cheeks as it hit me all over again how I hadn’t even considered they might’ve been from Kiron.
He’d been on my mind since the second we met.
I felt stupid about it now.
Kiron broke the silence. “I wanted to check in with you and see how you’re doing.”
“ Me ?” I was confused. “It should be me checking in on you , Kiron.” I hid my face behind the menu. “I thought you might be pissed off at me. You know… because of what I did after we kissed.”
He grabbed the menu, gently tugging it down.
“I was talking about the whole vampire situation.” He shifted in the booth, turning more toward me, one arm stretching along the back behind my shoulders.
“But, if you wanna talk about the fact that you kissed me and then fucked two of my hive mates, we can. Though, I’m not entirely sure that’s good breakfast conversation, little spitfire. ”
I groaned, hiding behind the menu again, fanning my face with it.
Oh my God.
Was he teasing me?
I peeked around the menu at him, and yep, a lazy smile tugged on his handsome face. So he wasn’t mad. Which was confusing, because yesterday he’d looked ready to throw hands when he walked into the kitchen and saw me alone with Nik and Harlow. And that was before I’d slept with them.
This man was confusing as hell.
“Whatever you’re thinking, Sina, just say it. You can ask me anything.”
He twisted further, his wide shoulders blocking out most of the restaurant.
“Why are you not mad? You should definitely be mad.” The next words came out before I could stop them. “I would be mad if you even let someone else touch you—”
My eyes widened. Oh my god Sina. Please stop talking.
Why did I say that out loud?
At this rate, I wasn’t going to make it past breakfast. I was going to die of mortification, keel over right here in the middle of the crowded diner.
The waitress showed up before Kiron could comment on my jealous declaration. You’d think that would help the situation. Nope . Not even a little bit.
Kill. Me. Now.
“Coffee?” she asked brightly.
“Yes, please!” My voice was a little too high. “ So much coffee.”
“I’m good thanks,” Kiron said, completely calm, like I hadn’t just verbally staked a claim on him in the middle of a diner at ten in the morning .
All it did was trap me in my own embarrassment while she cheerfully asked if we were ready to order. I glanced at the menu and pointed at something random. She scribbled on her pad and walked off, leaving the awkwardness hanging between us like a neon sign.
I risked a glance up. He was watching me, one dark brow lifting slowly.
“You’d be mad if someone else touched me?”
Oh no.
“I— that’s not— I mean —” I floundered, waving a hand uselessly. “That came out wrong.”
“No. I don’t think it did, little spitfire,” he said, looking like the cat who got the cream. I snorted at my own lame joke, trying to regulate my embarrassment. Heat rushed to my face all over again. “You get jealous. You don’t like the idea of someone else having their hands on me.”
My mouth opened and closed repeatedly, like a fish out of water gasping for fucking air.
“I— that’s not—” I tried, then groaned and dropped my forehead to the edge of the menu. “Can we rewind like thirty seconds? I’d like to resubmit my answer.”
A low chuckle rumbled out of him.
“Sina, I like that you feel that way.”
I blinked up at him. “You… what ?”
“I like that you get jealous,” he clarified. “Means you care. Means what’s happening between us isn’t just in my head.”
My heart did a weird, swoopy thing that was absolutely not helpful for maintaining dignity.
“If that’s true, then you really should be mad at me,” I whisper-shouted.
His mouth twitched. “You think I should be mad? ”
“ Yesss ,” I hissed louder than I should in a crowded restaurant. “What kind of person kisses one man and then sleeps with two others? Any normal person would be at least a little murdery about that.”
The waitress came back with coffee, and I wrapped both hands around the mug.
He leaned forward a little, one forearm resting on the table, boxing me in further. “I wasn’t mad. I was fucking jealous, princess,” he corrected.
“ Princess? Why do you keep calling me that today?” I murmured, searching his eyes. He’d never called me that before today, it was always ‘little spitfire’.
He hummed. “It felt fitting. You’re our princess, and if you want all of my hive, I won’t stop you.
My jealousy is my own shit. You got me? It’s got nothing to do with you.
You need to sort through your own feelings, Sina.
Stop feeling guilty for wanting us. You just got thrown into our world without warning.
If anything, I’m mad at how Nikolai told you and at myself for being a coward and not telling you when I met you that you are mine. ”
His jaw tightened briefly. “Ours,” he corrected. “And I’m not going to make you choose between any of us.”
That hit somewhere deep in my chest. “I won’t be the one that makes this harder for you. I don’t understand it completely, Kiron. But I know you struggle to keep control, and I don’t make that easier on you.”
He shook his head before I even finished talking. “Like I said, that’s my own shit to deal with. You’re ours , princess. And you get to feel whatever the hell you feel. None of us get to take that from you.”
I swallowed, blinking down at the table. My brain heard what he said. The rest of me was stuck on the word princess.
Our princess .
Like I was something precious. I shouldn’t have liked hearing that from anyone, but from Kiron it hit differently. In his eyes I wasn’t just a selfish girl making a string of questionable decisions. I mattered to him.
God, that was dangerous for my heart.
Kiron pinched my chin, forcing my gaze back up to his. He leaned in and pressed his lips to mine. The kiss was brief, soft in a way that surprised me. I melted into his touch before I could overthink it. Warmth spread through my chest, slow and steady, easing something tight in my chest.
He pulled back just enough for our eyes to meet again, his forehead resting against mine for a quiet second. His thumb stayed under my chin. “Tell me what you’re thinking. Don’t hide from me.”
My mouth opened. Nothing came out.
Because what was I supposed to say?
That my heart was doing backflips over a nickname? That the word ours thawed the ice around my heart and felt like a trap at the same time? That I wanted to lean into it so badly it scared me? I swallowed hard and forced something resembling a breath.
“I’m thinking you shouldn’t say things like that so casually. And then kiss me like that . Might make me fall in love with you,” I said, trying for sass and landing somewhere closer to shaky honesty.
“I might be a monster, Sina, but if you hand me your heart, I’ll guard it with my fucking life.”
My throat tightened. I held his gaze, searching for the catch. A hint he was lying. There wasn’t one. That terrified me almost as much as it soothed me.
“You really mean that, don’t you?”
“I don’t say shit I don’t mean. Now stop worrying about my feelings and try to figure out what it is you want. ”
My lips parted to argue again but the flash of red in his eyes stopped me. I nodded once, small.
“Okay.”
His eyes softened, just a fraction.
“Okay,” he echoed, then he leaned back slightly, like he was giving me room to breathe again, though his gaze stayed locked on mine. “Now eat, because if Nik finds out I didn’t feed you, he’s going to stake me in my sleep.”
I blinked, then glanced down, only just noticing the plates in front of us. My lips twitched before I could stop them. That sounded exactly like Nikolai. Controlling, bossy, and apparently the only one of them who’d been keeping track of whether I was actually eating lately.
“Is that how you kill a vampire then? Stake or stab to the heart?” I asked, picking up my fork. “Nik had said something similar last night when he handed me a butcher knife.”
Kiron’s brow furrowed. “He handed you a knife?”
I blushed, dipping my chin to hide behind my hair. “I might’ve been provoking him.”
“Unbelievable,” he huffed under his breath, “Picking fights with alphas already.” He grinned and nodded toward my plate. “Eat first, Sina. Vampire murder lessons later.”
I scooped up some eggs and took my first bite while Kiron watched me with a strange, quiet satisfaction before finally turning back to his pancakes.
I hadn’t realized how hungry I was until the food hit my tongue. I chewed fast, swallowed, and immediately grabbed a piece of bacon like it might vanish if I didn’t claim it quickly enough.
I pointed my fork at him. “So you can eat real food. Is that part a myth then? ”
His mouth twitched, and for just a second the tip of a fang pressed against his lower lip. “Is that what you want to know? How to kill us and what we eat?”
I took a sip of coffee so I wouldn’t stare and shrugged. “I don’t know. I hadn’t really thought about it until now. Feels like information I should probably have. You know. What Hollywood got wrong.”
He let out a quiet laugh and shook his head. “We eat. We bleed. We fuck. ” His eyes darkened with lust. “We’re not as different as you think, Sina.”
Something about the way he said it made me pause, like there was more he wanted to tell me but wasn’t ready to yet. My life had flipped upside down in a single night. I shouldn’t have been surprised there were still truths waiting in the shadows.
Kiron finished and slid his plate aside while I pushed the last bit of cold hashbrowns around more than actually eating them.
I’d suddenly lost my appetite. There was still so much I didn’t know about their world, and every time I got sucked into their eyes I forgot to care.
It made me wonder just how dangerous this all really was and if I was stupid for not running when I’d had the chance.
When the waitress brought the check, he paid without looking at the total and left a few loose bills behind.
“Ready to go?”
I nodded, trying not to look as nervous as I suddenly felt, and before I could overthink it, my hand slipped into his again. And the mental gymnastics I'd been running calmed to a dull roar. It still amazed me just how much all of them affected me.
Outside, the sun was high in the sky. He held the door for me, his hand brushing the small of my back as we stepped onto the sidewalk and made our way to his bike. He handed me my helmet, his expression shifting into something almost shy .
“I want to take you somewhere. If you want to.”
“Sure. Where are we going?”
His face lit up like he’d expected me to say no. “My favorite spot in Ash Harbor. It’s where I go when I need time to think, and I want to show it to you. It’s a bit of a ride. The roads get twisty near the cliffs. You okay with that?”
The fact that he even asked did something warm and quiet to my chest that I didn’t really want to examine too closely.
“I’m good. Maybe after we could head back to my place?”
He nodded but didn’t quite meet my eyes.
I wanted to press, to ask what that hesitation meant, but if I was being honest, I was excited to spend more time with him.
I could worry about the rest later. I still wasn’t sure if this counted as a date, but the longer he held my hand, the more I really hoped it was.