Sweet Hatred-Chapter 231: A kiss

The air dipped. Even Ash blinked.

"Mm," Sylas drawled. "That didn’t sound like a professional observation, future brother-in-law."

Kael’s jaw ticked. "Watch your words."

"I thought you didn’t deal in rumors," Sylas said, innocent as a dove.

Ash was smiling now. Enjoying it. Sadist.

Stanley raised an eyebrow at his children. "Am I missing something?"

"No," the twin said in unison. It would’ve been funny if it didn’t feel like someone had a knife to my throat under the table.

The Vice President, unbothered, turned to me instead. "So, young lady. Which name here do you belong to?"

The question landed like a grenade dipped in wine. Before I could say anything,

"She belongs to herself," Kael said, his voice low and final.

And I could feel every eye on me. Sylas’s fingers tapped once against the back of my chair. Ash reached for her wine.

Mr. Stanley just smiled like he was watching a new war bloom.

The room applauded again as the next performance began, masking the tension with music.

But inside that little circle of power, the silence roared.

---

The music was faded now. The lights dimmed. The hush that fell was a command, not a suggestion.

All eyes turned to the center stage where a curved obsidian platform had risen without a sound. Like something had clawed its way up from the earth.

Ashlyn stood beside it now, her silhouette gleaming in fitted red satin and her golden mask gleaming like a crown. She held the mic like she’d been born to conquer.

"Ladies and gentlemen," she began, her voice smooth and sharp. "Tonight, you are not just attendees of a gala. You are witnesses to a revolution."

A ripple of murmurs. Cameras whispered.

"This, " she gestured behind her, where a display case slowly unveiled itself, glossy glass parting to reveal something sleek, silver, and small, shaped almost like a flattened teardrop, ", is the future of human capability. The ZephyrCore."

A low electronic pulse began to hum beneath the words.

"It enhances memory. Processes trauma. Links cognition with real-time data and global cloud access. Emotional optimization, intelligence mapping, behavioral syncing. This isn’t just about technology. It’s about what we can become."

Bullshit. But beautiful bullshit.

Next to her, Kael appeared. He didn’t need a mic. His presence was its own frequency.

"We won’t ask you to imagine the future," he said, voice low and controlled, as if he were seducing the room. "Because it’s already inside the skulls of a hundred volunteers. And in twelve months, it’ll be in the heads of half the people in this room."

The crowd stilled, frozen somewhere between awe and terror. I was on the terrified part.

"Welcome," he said, "to the new world."

Silence. Then thunderous applause. Glasses raised. Some guests on their feet.

Stanley stepped forward and took the mic briefly. "To the fearless minds who risked everything for this innovation. And to those who know, power lies not in waiting for history to be made, but in writing it with your own hands."

He raised a flute of champagne. The Vice President mirrored it. Everyone followed.

"To the Next Evolution."

I didn’t drink. The flute trembled in my fingers.

•••

The toast was still ringing in the air when the lights dimmed again, not to silence us this time, but to pull us under.

A haunting melody bled through the speakers, strings stretched taut like nerves. Then from the vaulted ceiling, they dropped. Dancers, suspended on gossamer threads of wire and light, spiraled down like fallen angels in gold and bone-white.

Their bodies moved like water bending to music. Slow. Controlled. Tragic.

One dancer wore a mask shaped like the ZephyrCore itself, and I couldn’t help but shiver at the way they all circled around it like a holy relic.

It was beautiful. And terrifying.

The audience was still as stone. And somewhere in the crowd, I felt Kael’s gaze again. Like fingertips brushing the back of my neck.

•••

The room shifted again.

The center parted like a blooming flower and a ring of long dark tables emerged, flanked by gilded chairs. Champagne was refilled. Plates of artfully soulless food placed before us. Music played softly, and silver clinked gently on porcelain.

Ash and her father sat like twin monarchs at the table’s apex. The Vice President nearby, still whispering politics into wine glasses. And Kael... he sat two seats across from me. Silent. Shadowed. Watching.

He hadn’t said a word to me all evening.

Maybe that was worse than if he had.

I laughed at something Sylas whispered beside me. I didn’t even hear it. I just needed something to fill the void inside my chest.

The orchestra swelled. The kind of music that lured secrets out of mouths. The kind of music you bled to in designer heels.

Couples started drifting onto the polished marble. Masked faces, close bodies, shadows dancing with desire and politics alike.

"Come," Sylas said beside me, standing and offering a gloved hand.

I blinked. "I’m not..."

He didn’t wait. He just tugged.

And somehow... I let him.

My heels clicked like confessions against the marble. His hand slid around my waist. Closer than he should. Warm. Steady.

"You looked uncomfortable earlier," Sylas murmured into my ear, voice low and silk-wrapped. "Like you were ready to rip your dress off and bolt."

I stiffened.

He drew me closer.

"I think the most enjoyable part of this boring night...is trying to figure out what you’re thinking, Aria," he whispered. "Or who you’re thinking about."

I didn’t answer.

Because the only person I couldn’t get out of my mind was now standing at the edge of the ballroom, drink in hand, jaw like carved steel. Watching.

Always watching. But not coming.

Not stopping Sylas. Not pulling me away like he always did. Someone who usually couldn’t stand when someone breathed too much near me.

It burned more than I could admit. Maybe this was what I wanted, wasn’t it?

Maybe Kael had finally let go. Maybe he finally didn’t care.

But if that was true... why did it hurt so fucking much?

Maybe I was the whole problem after all. Wanting the fire and flinching at the heat. Wanting space but aching when he gave it. Always somehow forgetting all the beautiful things he said to me. I asked him to let go, and now that he might’ve, I felt like I was unraveling. Like I couldn’t breathe right without his hands on me.

Sylas spun me. His smile lazy. Dangerous.

Kael... didn’t look away.

And then, a kiss.

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