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Kieran learned very early that happiness was not a permanent state, but a brief accident.
There was a time, sometimes he doubts it was even real, when the world was warm. His mother wrapped him in arms that smelled like home, his father was there, steady, present, and Cedric laughed with him as if the future could never reach them. Then night arrived with foreign fangs. The werewolves didn’t just take his mother from him: they tore away the very idea of safety. After that, his father became a distant shadow, and his brother sank into a hatred that left room for no one else.
Kieran was left alone.
Maybe that’s why, over the years, he found himself watching happy families too closely. Not with contempt, but with something far more shameful: a childish mix of jealousy and longing. As if looking closely enough might teach him how a normal life was supposed to be lived.
For the same reason, Marcella became his refuge, his only certainty during childhood, but even she had a world of her own. Kieran learned to keep his problems to himself, not to be a burden, to swallow his pain.
Yes... He had been given only a fragment of love. A small, fragile piece. And it was taken from him before he could learn how to hold it.
With time, happy laughter grew blurry. He no longer remembers it clearly; only the echo remains, insistent, of loneliness.
That’s why, when he got together with Mason, when life, with an almost cruel irony, decided to give him a family, something inside him never quite settled into place. He loves Mason. He truly loves him. But gatherings with the Kanes are an open wound: gardens full of voices, shared jokes, affection that flows without effort. It is seeing, laid bare, everything he never had.
He doesn’t want to feel resentment. Not toward his partner. He should be glad that at least one of them knew a complete childhood. And yet, his hands tremble.
From where he is, he hears the chatter in Roger’s garden. Mason tries to soften the invisible divide that always exists; Lily and Liam help, almost without realizing it. Chancy watches the chaos with an unsettling calm. Harry, meanwhile, carries Seraphine as if she weighed nothing at all, showing her flowers with a wide smile, and the girl laughs, bright, happy.
Kieran tries to breathe.
The sting eases when he notices Rowan’s absence.
He doesn’t even manage to stand before he feels a tug at his pants. He looks down, and there is Wanny, brow furrowed, serious for someone so small.
—What’s wrong, pup?—
He asks gently.
—Why aren’t you with your sister looking at flowers?—
Rowan frowns even harder, as if the entire world had personally offended him.
—I don’t like it.—
—Then... why don’t you help the others?—
The look he gets is pure indignation, as if he had suggested something unforgivable.
—No!—
Kieran sighs. Phina adores the Kanes as much as the Callistos; Rowan, on the other hand, would choose the vampires’ silent mansion a thousand times over. Something in him bristles among so many alphas, even when Mason and Chancy make an effort to restrain themselves. He tolerates Lily and Liam. Sometimes he lets Harry carry him. But he always ends up hiding behind his sister or clinging to Kieran, as if the world were simply too big.
Mason had once told him about a wolf’s sense of smell: about memories trapped in the air, about emotions that leave a trail. Maybe that was it. Maybe Rowan could smell things Kieran would never learn how to name.
Kieran doesn’t have the head to think about it now.
—Do you want me to carry you?—
Rowan nods immediately and lifts his arms. The vampire picks him up without effort; the child hides inside his black jacket, breathing urgently, searching for something only he seems to need.
—I want to go home—
He murmurs, with a pout.
Kieran hears the laughter in the distance. He sees Seraphine happy. He sees Mason smiling.
Even so.
He lowers his gaze to his son, tightens the embrace just a little, and answers in a low voice, like a confession he finally allows himself:
—I do too.—