Page 40 of Pretend Wife (Angels of the Secret Order #4)

TWENTY-NINE

Hayden

My entire life was a lie.

Perhaps that sounded dramatic, but it felt like the truth. Everything I thought I’d known had just been turned on its head. The rug had been yanked from beneath me, and I was falling, knowing it was going to fucking hurt when I hit the bottom.

A part of me wanted to run, to grab Danielle and get the hell out of there. Not that this was the kind of thing I could run from, not unless I could find a way to go back in time to when my life made sense even if it was all a lie.

I stared around the room of people who suddenly seemed like strangers to me.

Most of them weren’t even human, not fully anyway. Including my sister.

Maggie was only my half sister.

My eyes found Dad. He looked pale, even more so than normal, but not like a man who was learning that his oldest child wasn’t his.

Did he already know?

I thought about the way he’d practically ignored Maggie at family events, how he wasn’t leaving her any of the inheritance despite her being his firstborn. I’d thought he was just a sexist ass, but maybe it had more to do with her not being his than her being a girl.

Had Mom cheated on him? I’d always blamed my father for the state of their marriage—he’d consistently put his company and his social life above my mom—but maybe I’d been wrong. Maybe it was her fault all along.

And then there was the tidbit about Maggie’s real father being a demon.

And not just any demon but the one who’d been threatening Danielle.

Just a few days ago, I’d fantasized about murdering him for hurting my woman.

Only now I didn’t know what to think. He was Maggie’s father.

He’d brought me to Danielle the day of my car accident.

I was supposed to die in that crash.

Without him and Danielle, I would have.

I’d heard stories about people who had near-death experiences, people who had seen the afterlife or looked down on their own bodies as their soul left. Realizing I was supposed to be dead right now wasn’t nearly as dramatic, but it shook me to my core.

I should have died. Every day I’d lived in the past two plus years was stolen time. I was only here because a demon and an angel had intervened on my behalf.

How was I supposed to wrap my head around that? Accept it ?

I wasn’t sure how to make sense of any of the things I’d learned today. My mother had an affair with a demon. My sister was only half human. My PA’s husband had wings. And my wife…

The first time I’d seen Danielle when I woke up in the hospital bed, I’d thought she was an angel. Yet I’d never really imagined that I could be right. It was too impossible.

How had I not known? We’d been living together for months. We shared a life, a bed, our bodies. But I’d never seen the white wings that were spread from her back before today.

How many times had I touched her back, drawn circles on it, or kissed up and down her spine? How exactly had I missed the fact that she had wings?

This whole room was full of people who were supposed to be my family, and I felt like I didn’t really know any of them at all.

They’d all lied to me. Kept secrets and hid things from me like I wasn’t worthy of knowing the truth.

Was this forever going to be the role I would play? The fool who always missed the signs?

“Hayden?” The sound of my name yanked me out of my spinning thoughts.

Conversation buzzed around me. Everyone seemed to be making plans, discussing options and ideas like this was a normal evening for them. None of them looked lost or like their minds were spinning out of control. They were all just moving forward like they were fine.

I couldn’t focus on anything that was being said. I couldn’t find it in me to care about what happened next .

My eyes found Danielle’s. She was still standing protectively in front of Maggie, and she looked so beautiful with her wings, which were such a pure white they almost seemed to glow.

She met my gaze, and her eyes were so painfully the same as they’d always been.

They were the kind of eyes I could drown in, the kind I had drowned in many times.

I was paralyzed by the sight of her, the wings, those eyes, her body, which I’d traced every inch of.

She was an angel, a real, honest-to-God angel.

“Hayden,” the voice to my right said again, and I finally dragged my attention to my younger brother, who was staring at me with his brow furrowed. “Are you okay?”

“Did you know?” I asked.

“About what?” Miles chuckled, but it sounded forced and wrong. “We kind of unpacked a lot tonight.”

Wasn’t that the fucking truth.

“Any of it.”

“Hayden…” I didn’t like the look on his face, the one that said he felt sorry for me.

“Which part?” I demanded.

“I didn’t know most of it. I had no idea Maggie was… our half sister. I didn’t know about Danielle’s deal or that you almost died.”

“Did you know she was an angel?” The words burned on their way out, but I had to hear the answer.

The look on his face told me everything I needed to know.

“Hayden, calm down before you do something you’ll regret.” He said something else, but I couldn’t hear him. I couldn’t hear anything over the buzzing in my head. He’d known.

Everyone in this room was aware of the existence of angels and demons except for me.

The betrayal cut deep.

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt so alone.

Actually, that wasn’t true. I could remember it perfectly. This wasn’t the first time my world had collapsed and I’d found myself on the outside, looking in at people I thought were mine.

The first time, I’d learned my son wasn’t actually mine. That the family I’d thought I was going to have belonged to some other man.

This was different, but it hurt just as much.

I looked at my wife—the woman I’d given my heart to, whom I’d trusted with every secret and broken piece of myself.

Why hadn’t I been worthy of her secrets? Why had she trusted my brother and not me?

I turned around and walked out of the penthouse. I couldn’t be here any longer. I didn’t belong in this world of demons and angels and wars.

“Hayden, wait!” Danielle called after me.

My feet halted on their own, refusing to take another step down the hall, but I didn’t turn around.

“I’m sorry. This isn’t how I wanted to tell you, but I couldn’t find a better way. I needed everyone to know.”

“It sounds like everyone already did,” I said, my voice coming out as cold as my insides felt.

“I had no idea. I didn’t know your sister was his daughter. If I had, I would have done things differently. ”

I spun around to face her. Her wings were gone, and she looked like the woman I knew, the one I loved more than I’d thought possible. Her whisky eyes were glassy, tears clinging to her lashes.

Something in my chest squeezed, urging me to close the distance between us and hold her. I still wanted to take her pain away even if it meant cutting myself open and bleeding all over the floor.

“I wouldn’t have cared,” I said. “I loved you, and you being an angel or demon or whatever wouldn’t have changed that. But you didn’t trust me enough to tell me.”

“That’s not it! I was trying to protect you.”

“Really.”

“Yes, really. I tried to be as honest with you as possible, but my hands were tied. I was just trying to keep everyone safe.”

“And where does telling Miles the truth fit into that?”

She frowned, a small crease appearing between her eyebrows. “What?”

“Miles could know that you were an angel, but I couldn’t?”

“I didn’t tell Miles.”

“Don’t lie to me, Sunday School.”

“I’m not! I never told Miles.”

I shook my head. “Right.” I turned around and started walking again.

“Hayden, stop. Please.”

“Why? Are there more lies you want to tell me, more secrets?”

“Because I love you, and I want to talk about this. Please don’t go. Don’t walk away from us. ”

“I can’t do this right now.” If I stayed, I was going to say more things I couldn’t take back.

What I needed was some peace and quiet to deal with everything I’d just learned.

I didn’t want to talk to Danielle. I didn’t want to see her face or battle against the dual urges to comfort her and scream at her. I just needed to be fucking alone.

I stepped into the elevator and punched the button for the lobby without looking back into the hallway.

Just as the doors were closing, I heard Danielle’s sob, and the sound added another slice of pain through my aching chest. It haunted me as I left the building, as I walked into a liquor store and bought a bottle of scotch, as I checked into a hotel to avoid going home.

I poured glass after glass, trying to get the sound out of my head, my heart.

Eventually I gave up on the glass and just lifted the bottle to my lips.

I wanted to wash away the memory of her tears, her smile, her wings .

God, she’d been so beautiful it hurt to look at her.

She’d been mine. I’d believed that I could keep her forever. But now I wasn’t so sure I’d ever had her in the first place.

Could a person really be yours if you didn’t know the most basic things about them?

She was my wife, but I was the only one who hadn’t known she was an angel. And fuck, that hurt. It cut me open and made me feel useless.

That’s what I was in this situation, wasn’t it?

I couldn’t save her from the demon threatening her. I couldn’t protect her like her family could. I didn’t belong in her world. So how could I belong with her?

I lifted the scotch to my lips again. I was going to lose her. There was no way I could be good enough for an angel.

Someday she was going to realize it.

I was just a man, and she was something out of myths and legends.