ALEXANDER
I had long grown used to the silence. Silence was where I thrived, where I could focus, analyze, and plan without distraction. Yet tonight… the silence wasn’t empty.
It was filled with her presence.
Faye sat on the couch a few feet away, her posture straight, a book balanced across her lap. Strands of hair slipping from behind her ear as she studied the words like they might hold the answer to everything we were looking for. She was earnest, and I knew better than anyone how pointless it was.
I knew every single one of those books, cover to cover. I had read most of them twice over. My father had made sure of that. Before I was old enough to lead, before I even understood what leading truly meant, I was forced to memorize the histories, the traditions, the treaties, the ancie
