Nico
I heaved out a deep sigh as I called Alaric again, only for the line to cut abruptly before a cold automated voice inford that his phone had been switched off.
I stared at the screen for several long seconds afterward, irritation slowly settling inside my chest.
Why the hell had he called if he was not going to speak afterward?
Dramatic princess.
The thought crossed my mind almost imdiately as I tossed my phone carelessly onto the marble counter beside before heading toward the terrace of my penthouse.
The cool Monaco wind hit my skin the mont the glass doors slid open.
I was dressed in nothing except a loose pair of dark joggers hanging low against my hips while my upper body remained bare, exposing skin still slightly damp from the shower I had taken earlier.
The city glittered beautifully beneath the night sky beyond my terrace, expensive yachts floating quietly across the harbor while golden lights reflected against the dark diterranean like shattered pieces of glass.
Usually, I loved nights like this because they made the entire world feel far away from .
I pulled my vape from the pocket of my joggers before bringing it slowly toward my lips. The sleek black device glowed faintly the mont I inhaled deeply from it, cool waterlon mint flooding instantly across my tongue before the smoke settled heavily inside my lungs.
For a few seconds, I held it there.
Then I exhaled slowly into the night air, watching the pale smoke disappear into the Monaco wind.
"Your grandmother’s morial service will be held next month in Japan."
My mother’s voice echoed unpleasantly inside my head again, imdiately souring my mood further.
"The entire family will be there, and maybe if your race happens during the sa week, we will all co to support you, my dear son. Just make sure you attend because you have already missed it two years in a row, and your grandfather is not pleased about it."
Family.
The word itself felt aningless and empty to .
People loved throwing that word around as though sharing the sa blood automatically ant loyalty, safety, or love, but my family had never felt like any of those things.
Most of the ti, being around them only felt suffocating. Every conversation was carefully calculated. Every smile hid judgnt beneath it. Every gathering felt less like family and more like a performance where everybody silently pretended not to notice the rot underneath our na.
Knowing all of them would be gathered together in one place again was enough reason for to avoid the morial service entirely.
"Will Uncle Geum Ho be there?" I had asked quietly earlier that evening while already knowing the answer.
My mother had answered warmly over the phone, completely unaware of the way my stomach tightened at the re ntion of him.
"Yes, of course. The whole family is attending, which is exactly why you need to co this ti. All your cousins who never show up will be there too. It has been twenty years since your grandmother died, so naturally it is going to be a grand morial service, Nico. Please attend and invite that girlfriend of yours as well."
I had imdiately rubbed tiredly at my eyes afterward because she was not giving room to refuse.
"Fine," I muttered eventually. "I will be there, but if the dates clash with race weekend, I am not attending."
The conversation should have ended there, yet the irritation lingered unpleasantly inside long after the call was over. Even after setting my phone down and trying to distract myself, my mother’s words kept replaying endlessly in my head, pulling back toward mories and people I had spent years trying not to think about.
I barely rembered my grandmother anymore.
Most of my mories of her had faded with ti until they beca nothing more than brief fragnted monts that no longer felt completely real. Sotis I rembered the scent of her perfu lingering faintly through the house whenever she visited. Other tis, I rembered her soft voice speaking quietly in Japanese while serving tea in the garden during sumr gatherings. But beyond those small pieces, everything else felt distant now, blurred away by years, grief, and everything that happened afterward.
Andrew Park, my father’s younger brother, had been the only person in our family allowed to exist exactly as he wanted without sha attached to it. He lived openly with his husband now sowhere in Langose, completely detached from the suffocating expectations of the Park family.
Sotis I envied him for that.
Then there was Geum Ho.
Just thinking about him was enough to make my chest tighten painfully.
My grip around the vape stiffened instinctively while an uncomfortable feeling crawled slowly beneath my skin. Even after all these years, his na alone still had the ability to drag backward into mories I had spent most of my life trying desperately not to think about.
"Do not tell anyone. We are supposed to be family."
The words echoed sharply inside my head again, clear enough to make my stomach twist.
I could still rember exactly how his voice usually sounded every night. It was as if he thought he was genuinely protecting both of us instead of destroying piece by piece.
I hated him so much, hated the way the feel of his hands had affected all those years because Geum Ho had not been violent. Instead, he had always spoken softly afterward, always acting like whatever he did was normal.
I was still a child the first ti it happened. Then years passed, and sohow it never truly stopped until I ran away from ho.
And the worst part was that everybody loved him.
Geum Ho, the bastard son of the Park family, smiled easily during dinners. He spoke politely and looked composed and respectable beside the rest of the family while I sat there feeling sick every ti he walked into a room.
Then my grandfather found out, or maybe he had only discovered enough to realize sothing was wrong.
To this day, I still did not know exactly how much he knew because nobody ever spoke about it directly afterward, but what I do rember were the heated conversations between them and the way the issue had died down.
Nobody spoke about it again. Ever since then, my grandfather had beco nicer toward and let do whatever I wanted.
My uncle lived his life like nothing had happened, and I was left with the secret that could destroy the prestigious Park family.
A secret that had been a burden on for years.
That silence alone destroyed whatever remained between the three of us afterward.
I inhaled deeply from the vape again, the cool waterlon mint smoke burning faintly against my lungs before I tilted my head back toward the night sky, desperately trying to force those mories back into the darkest parts of my mind where they belonged.
When Alaric called earlier, I had stupidly expected hearing his voice would sohow ease the pressure sitting heavily inside my chest tonight.
What I felt was loneliness and the exhausting feeling of never quite belonging anywhere no matter how successful I beca.
Instead, he had switched off his phone after calling first.
"Seriously, what the hell is his problem?" I muttered beneath my breath before exhaling another slow stream of smoke into the air.
The worst part was that I had spent all day trying to get him out of my head. I tried so hard to ignore the way my cock hardened at the thought of him.
I wanted to fuck him again, and the growing boner between my legs only proved how badly I needed a release. Yet the only thing I could think about was going to his apartnt.
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