FAYE
The letter wouldn’t leave me alone.
Even after Alexander folded it neatly and tucked it away like it was nothing more than a routine message, I couldn’t get the words out of my head. Brother. That one word had felt heavier than the rest of the page, pressing into my chest with a weight I couldn’t shake off.
Marcus. The name rolled like thunder in the silence of my thoughts. I had seen Alexander’s face when he read it—he hid it well, but I knew him too much by now. That flicker of unease, the shadow of something he didn’t want us to notice. He had dismissed my questions quickly, maybe too quickly, shutting down any possibility that his bloodline wasn’t as straightforward as he claimed.
But that letter was too precise. Too deliberate. Whoever wrote it knew exactly how to wound him,
