Caden
FOUR MONTHS AFTER THE WAR
A bottle of pálinka hung from my fingers.
The sharp breeze off the Danube ruffled through my hair, stinging my face.
My legs dangled from the catwalk, my arms folded over the railing, keeping me from tumbling to my death far below.
I squinted down at the completely reconstructed HDF building, which was opening in June to the public as The House of the People.
Slapping on fresh paint and changing the carpet would never bury the ghosts of this place. Not to me. Sometimes I swear I could hear my father calling me from his office or see officers and dead friends walking around. It was all in my head, but it still messed with me. Haunted me.
Killian gave a speech tonight in the plaza, and thousands of people turned out for it.
He was a born leader. He filled the role as president to a T.
Looks, charm, compassion, and drive. The role my father was conditioning me for, though Killian made me see how much I was no longer that person, if I ever was.
Taking another swig, my mind went back to all the times Brexley and I sat up here, staring across the river at the fae palace, hiding from my father or some mandatory event we escaped.
How clueless we were about life, about real sacrifice and pain.
How that one night up here, deciding to rob that train, changed the course of our lives forever.
It altered everything. If we never left this spot, going to bed instead, she and I would be married to people we hated, playing roles my father forced upon us, living lives that weren’t ours.
We would be puppets to my father’s whims, letting him do everything he wanted without us ever knowing the truth of his real madness.
It frightened me how that single choice could have set our entire lives on a different path. How empty and tragic our lives would have been.
Even knowing all I did, what was ahead . . .
“Hey.” A voice called out to me. It hooked in my chest and tugged at my gut. “Is this a pity party for one, or can another join?”
Curving my head, I took in the petite woman strolling up to me dressed in all black, her white-blonde hair whipping and knotting in the wind, her red lips curved just slightly, causing my dick to twitch.
My fingers rolled into fists at the image of them tugging those very strands last night, making her cry out. We broke the fucking bed.
I shifted, hiding my erection, taking another gulp, my brows furrowing. “How did you find me?”
Birdie lifted a shoulder, settling down next to me.
I knew how. It was how I found her every fuckin’ night, no matter if I knew where she was or not.
Like a fucking GPS.
We never talked about it. I didn’t even want to think about it, even if my gut knew. It scared the shit out of me.
Things were said during the war we both pretended were never spoken. When you think you might die, you get a lot more emotional. Now that we survived and were not in any life and death situations, we went back to pretending we didn’t care about each other.
In front of people, anyway.
Though day or night, we fucked like we couldn’t ever get enough. In closets, showers, on and under desks, against lockers, in the stairway, wherever we could.
I blamed it on the extra adrenaline we both built up throughout the day.
Killian had put me, Birdie, and Bakos in charge of training the new military recruits under him.
Killian did not forget what Bakos did for us when they were sneaking into HDF.
He honored the cryptic message only a few of us knew and helped Killian and Rosie.
For his safety, he played a part, but later we found he had defected, turning against HDF.
Killian wanted to acknowledge that.
Bakos held a slightly higher position, staying closer to a desk while Birdie and I were the new trainers, getting worked up and sweaty all day—wrestling on mats, target practice, obstacle courses . . . nothing seemed to turn my girl on more than fighting.
I went still, realizing what I had just said in my head.
My girl.
Shit.
Lifting the bottle to my lips, I tried to drown all my thoughts. Birdie grabbed it from me, taking some.
“Help yourself.”
“I. Will.” She stared right at me, letting me know there was a lot more she wanted. It took everything in me not to take the bait, keeping my expression blank.
She sighed, turning her attention out to the palace across the river. Killian was living in it again but decided to open half of it up for tours and events. He and Rosie stayed in a private wing in the newly built section.
“You’re in a mood,” she muttered. “You can’t still be angry?”
My shoulders went up to my ears. Fuck yes, I could.
“Caden . . .”
“You don’t know how it feels,” I snapped. “It should have been me. I should have killed him. Brexley took that from me.”
“No, she didn’t.” Birdie shook her head. “You really think you’d be okay killing your own father?”
I opened my mouth.
“Don’t say yes, like it’s so easy. No matter what he did, he was still your dad.” Birdie scooted closer, her hand touching my jaw. “She saved you.”
“Saved me?”
“If you had killed him . . . I’m not sure you would have come back from that. Istvan would have darkened your soul.”
“My soul is already dark.” I kept my eyes down, feeling the truth somewhere inside.
“Look at me, pretty boy.” She forced my chin up.
“You can be upset, but don’t cut her out of your life.
She’s too much a part of you. And she doesn’t deserve it.
It wasn’t easy for Brex to make that choice.
Now she will live with his death for the rest of her life.
Know she did it because she loves you, not to take it away from you. ”
My teeth crunched together, my head turning back out to the water.
I knew it; I could feel Warwick berating me daily about forgiving Brexley, but I wasn’t quite ready to let it go just yet.
Not completely. I would, though. Brexley was far too important to me to not have her in my life.
I missed her. It even felt strange to have Birdie up here at our hiding spot instead of Brexley, but as I peered back at the blonde next to me, nothing like what I thought I’d be attracted to, I realized it was no longer Brexley I wanted sitting next to me.
It was time to let go of the past . . . and christen my future.
A ravenous grin curled my mouth, my hands sliding into Birdie’s hair, tugging it firmly. Her eyes flashed, and her nose flared, making my dick so hard it ached. “You know, I’ve always wanted to have sex up here.”
“You never have before?”
“Nope.” At the time, this place was sacred to me. It was Brexley’s and my safe spot. I would never have brought another girl up here. I always imagined Brex and me finally crossing that line up here, and we almost did before everything went to hell.
Now I was glad, because there was only one I wanted to slide my dick into under the stars, to claim on top of the old HDF building, tearing down all the old ideas and dreams.
Ripping off her clothes, I laid her back on the cool metal, her hands shoving my pants down while I tore off my shirt. The wind whipped against our skin, heightening the sensations. Her legs spread wide for me.
“Caden.” Her plea went straight to my cock.
We weren’t good at foreplay. We liked fucking each other too much.
I pushed inside her, a groan coming from my chest, my brain not understanding how it seemed to get better. With so many others, I got bored quickly, but with Birdie, I never did.
And that scared me because I had a feeling I never would.
“Fuck! Caden!” She howled, giving back just as hard, her nails digging into me.
Pounding into her, her back arched, my name ringing in the air.
Far below, I could hear the sounds of the lapping river and people moving around in the square.
In the distance, a train whistle howled into the night, reminding me of so many nights up here with Brexley, hatching her plans to steal from them and give back to the poor.
It felt like a symbolic gesture, closing that first part of my life.
My father was dead, and my mother was off in Prague starting a new life.
I had a future half-brother, the prince of Ukraine, born to not only replace me but kill me, a bond to a pain in the ass legend that would never go away, and a vengeance seething in the back of my mind for those who escaped us that night.
Kalaraja, Sonya, Iain, Joska, and Samu .
. . it wouldn’t be long before I desired their blood too much.
Even as only half a legend, I understood the craving for death, for revenge.
It filled me now and pumped in my veins.
I no longer hated what I was.
I felt alive, like I had lived in a bubble before. Dull. Lifeless.
The story of human Caden had come to an end.
This next story might be tragic, most likely bloody, but it would be fucking real.