Chapter 165: ¹⁶⁵: a toy he used

Chapter 165: 1??: a toy he used

Absent-mindedly, I lifted my hand and caressed Kael’s neck, my fingers moving gently over his skin before slipping into his hair. The simple act of having something of him to hold on to felt strangely reassuring.

My heart was still racing, my thoughts were still a mess, and yet, keeping my hand there gave me something to focus on besides the questions swirling inside my head.

Kael shifted slightly, his head moving as his lips brushed against my neck. The contact was soft, almost tentative, and the strange sensation in my stomach grew stronger.

It unsettled me how easily a moment like this could leave me so confused. What was I even feeling?

The question had been following me for a while now, and I still couldn’t find an answer that made sense. Everything about this was unfamiliar to me. I had never experienced anything quite like it, never found myself so uncertain about my own thoughts or so unable to understand my reactions.

I was supposed to be concentrating on Kael.

That had been the point of all this, hadn’t it? I wanted him to feel comfortable around me, to let his guard down and stop treating every interaction between us like another battle he needed to win. I wanted him to trust me enough, enough for me to use that trust.

Those were the things I should have been thinking about. Instead, my mind had gone strangely quiet.

All I could focus on was Kael’s presence, the warmth of having him close, and the unexpected tenderness of his movements. There was something disarming about seeing this side of him, especially after the frustration and anger that had passed between us only moments ago.

It made me question whether I had misunderstood him all along. Or perhaps I was simply seeing what I wanted to see.

Before I could examine that thought any further, my arms began to move. I wrapped them around Kael slowly, hesitating halfway through the gesture as though some part of me was waiting for permission that would never come.

It was such a simple thing to do. A hug. Nothing more.

And yet, I felt as though I were crossing a boundary I had drawn for myself long before this moment. I hadn’t planned to do this. I hadn’t decided that I wanted to hold him, either. The movement had come so naturally that I hadn’t even realized what I was doing until my arms were already around him.

For a second, I considered pulling away. Then I felt him there, close enough that I no longer had to wonder what it would be like to have him near without an argument waiting to happen between us.

My resolve began to crumble. I tightened my arms around him, slowly at first, then with a little more certainty. My head followed almost instinctively, turning until I could rest my face against his neck.

The moment I did, the thoughts crowding my mind seemed to fade. I closed my eyes, allowing myself a brief pause from all the questions I had been asking since this strange exchange began.

His familiar, earthy scent surrounded me, carrying a subtle musk that I had somehow come to associate with him. It was comforting in a way I couldn’t explain, and that only made the experience more bewildering.

I wanted to stay like this.

The realization arrived so quietly that, for a moment, I didn’t recognize how dangerous it felt to me, not because anything was necessarily wrong with the moment itself, but because of what it seemed to suggest about my own feelings.

What was this feeling? Was I beginning to... No. I immediately rejected the thought, almost before I had allowed myself to finish it.

No. That wasn’t possible. And even if it were, I wouldn’t let it happen.

The realization should have been enough to bring me back to my senses. Instead, it was the sudden change in Kael that finally broke through the haze surrounding my thoughts.

Until then, he had been resting against me, his presence calm and his movements unhurried. There had been an ease to him that I hadn’t expected, a quiet consideration that had made it easier for me to forget how tense things had been only moments earlier.

But now, something was different. At first, I couldn’t identify what had changed. Kael hadn’t said anything, and he hadn’t moved away from me. He was still close, still resting against me, yet the ease I had noticed before was gone.

His body had grown rigid. I became aware of the tension in his muscles, of the sudden stillness that seemed to settle over him. It was subtle, but once I noticed it, I couldn’t ignore it.

My heart gave an uneasy thud. Had he realized what I was doing? The question exploded through my mind, scattering every comforting thought I had managed to hold on to.

Without wasting another second, I pulled my head back. The movement was quicker than I intended, and the sudden distance between us felt almost startling. I drew in a deep breath, filling my lungs with the crisp air of the room as though I had only just remembered how to breathe.

The intoxicating scent of Kael that had made me feel like heaven was gone, replaced by the cool air between us.

My arms, which had been wrapped around him only moments ago, were the next to move.

I slowly loosened them, suddenly unsure of what to do with my hands now that I had become so painfully aware of my own actions. My fingers hovered awkwardly between us before I drew them back, my gaze darting frantically toward Kael’s face in search of some indication of what he was thinking.

I needed to understand his reaction. Anything would have been better than this silence. But I barely had time to gather my thoughts before Kael caught my wrists and pinned my hands above my head against the couch.

My breath caught. He shifted back enough to look directly into my face, his dark eyes meeting mine with an intensity that made it impossible to look anywhere else. I swallowed involuntarily, trying to make sense of the strange, clouded expression on his face.

He looked at me as though I had committed some terrible crime. I couldn’t even comprehend what had changed. Hadn’t we been fine just moments ago?

"Kael... I..." I began, but the words stumbled out of my mouth and died before I could complete the sentence.

What was I supposed to say? That I hadn’t meant to hold him so tightly? That I hadn’t understood why I wanted to stay close to him? None of those explanations seemed safe enough to voice.

"It has been a while since we’ve been doing all this, Athena," Kael said suddenly.

His words were measured, but his voice sounded strained. He gestured toward the space between us, referring to our arrangement as though he were discussing an obligation we had both agreed to fulfill.

There was no warmth in his expression, nothing that could reassure me that I hadn’t imagined the change in him. The way he spoke made the entire situation sound like a task, something to be completed rather than a moment shared between two people.

"Today as well," he continued, his voice growing colder with every word. "I came here for nothing but this. The thing you needed from me, and the thing we needed to do for me to get my heir."

The words sank in slowly, each one settling somewhere painfully deep inside me. I had known the terms of our arrangement from the beginning. I had understood why we were doing this. But hearing him say it like that was different.

My eyes began to sting. I tried to hold his gaze, refusing to let him see how deeply his words had affected me. Yet the longer I looked at his expressionless face, the harder that became.

I had been seeing this version of him for so long; the cold, distant man who could make me feel insignificant with a handful of carefully chosen words. I knew how he behaved when he wanted to remind me of the distance between us.

And I knew how different he had seemed when we first met. So why had I allowed myself to focus on those fleeting moments of tenderness? Why had I let myself believe they revealed something real when he could dismiss them so easily now?

The thought made my throat tighten, and I forced myself to speak before the silence could swallow me whole.

"What do you mean by saying it has been a long time?" I asked. My voice sounded strained, carrying the weight of everything I couldn’t bring myself to say. I hated how unsteady it sounded, especially after the confidence I had tried so hard to maintain around him.

Kael scoffed. "You understand perfectly well what I meant by that, Athena." There was no hesitation in his answer, no attempt to soften the words or explain himself. He spoke as though my question were nothing more than a pointless attempt to avoid a truth we both already knew.

Then he released me and moved away leaving me sprawled on the couch just like that, as if I was nothing but a toy he was done using.