A/N: TW in this chapter for brief bits of abusive/manipulative relationships.
The Thing About Ballet
The thing about ballet was, Kase knew nothing about it.
Sure, he had a picture in his head of girls in tutus standing on their tip toes twirling in circles, but he had no idea how much work actually went into pulling off a production. He sure as hell wasn't expecting for Neelam to come tearing into his bedroom and ripping off the sheets to wake him before the sun rose despite his numerous protests that it was not seven yet. That meant nothing to Neelam. Apparently there was an emergency that required their immediate attention and there was no getting out of it no matter how much Kase grumped.
Which was how he found himself half-dead and hopped up on caffeine, carting large boxes of fake foliage backstage to avoid Neelam's wrath onstage when two familiar faces showed up.
"Oncle Kasssse!" Manon cried, running as fast as her little feet could carry her. She lisped on all her s-es, so what really came out sounded more like "Oncle Kathhhe!"
Kase dropped the box he was holding immediately, not caring if whatever was inside was fragile or not. He had a Manon to pick up and spin around, her shrieking giggles a better pick-me-up than anything he could have asked for.
"Look at you! So big!" He tickled her leotard-clad stomach just to hear her laugh some more.
"Do you like my tutu Oncle Kase?"
The tutu in question was a huge sparkly thing only eclipsed in size by the kinky curls of her hair, a tutu that could not have possibly been up to Neelam's strict dress code. But it was Manon's, so it was perfect.
"I love it," Kase said, making sure that Manon could see just how serious he was. "You are gonna be the prettiest ballerina in the show."
"Recital, Oncle Kase," Manon corrected, ever knowing all. "It's called a recital."
"Okay smarty pants." Kase let Manon down so that he could talk to her properly. "What part are you playing in this recital?"
"I'm gonna be a snowflake!"
"A snowflake who is in trouble for not waiting for her father like she was told."
Henri walked leisurely up the center aisle and up the side steps to the stage, shaking his head at his daughter. He looked like a man who had found himself in this situation one too many times to count and had long since given up being angry about it.
"Sorry Papa."
Manon didn't look too sorry, but her pouty bottom lip and wide brown eyes made it impossible for her to stay in trouble for long.
"I need all ballerinas stage left s'il vous plaît!"
Neelam's voice carried across the stage and all the way down the aisles so that it was impossible not to have heard the call to action. Manon squealed with excitement, bouncing up and down before dashing off faster than Henri could catch her. If this was how hard it was to wrangle Manon now, there were bad times in store for Henri and Elyan's future. But Kase kept his mouth shut, smirking at Henri's expression of pure exasperation. Some things were better left discovered at their own pace.
"Did Neelam coerce you into helping as well?" Kase asked. Henri wasn't exactly dressed for manual labor, not with his classic black suit and thick black coat on top. Kase looked like a hoodlum in comparison with his oversized sweatshirt and worn jeans.
"No, just dropping Manon off for practice."
Kase was confused. "Not to be insensitive, but I thought the recital was for the Rambouillet Children's Home?"
"It is. But Manon...well..." Henri shrugged his shoulders, and that was all he needed to do to get the point across. "Les Reines pulled some strings and had her included."
"I don't blame them. Who could say no to that face?"
No one could ever say no to Manon. Mostly because to say no to Manon meant to endure a temper tantrum so legendary that it could be heard across the Atlantic.
"Certainly not me." Henri, the man who could take down hardened criminals and had probably looked Satan in the eye without flinching, balked at the idea of crossing his three-foot tall daughter. "Elyan has some success...sometimes."
"She didn't want to come see her little snowflake off to rehearsal?"
"Sa Majesté has her working on a housing project. It has been occupying most of her time."
"What? Is Versailles getting a face lift? Maybe a coffee shop?"
Henri's lips quirked up a hair, the closest thing to a smile Kase ever saw. "Something like that."
Damn, Kase forgot how frustratingly vague Henri could be.
The phone in Kase's pocket vibrated, distracting him from further interrogating Henri. Henri didn't seem to mind, silently sneaking towards the exit, his mission of delivering his daughter to rehearsal on time complete. The phone continued to vibrate as Kase fumbled for it. Great! So a call, not a text. Who the hell was using international minutes to call him?
The call dropped as soon as the screen lit up, going to voicemail. Just his luck. Plus said missed call and now current voicemail were from Elodie. Double his luck.
Ten minutes prior to the call (when he was busy spinning Manon) Elodie had sent him a single text: Have you seen this?
Attached was a link to an article from one of the more credible international tabloids. The title read: A Royal Nightmare! Russian Princess Alexandrina Spills Dirty Details on Split with Illéan Bad Boy Prince Kasey.
What. The. Fuck.
Shaking fingers pressed on the link. He didn't want to know. He really didn't want to know whatever it was that Drina had said about them. Whatever she felt, whatever she thought was happening, Kase didn't want to hear it. He didn't want to see it. He didn't -
He couldn't stop himself from reading. As much as it hurt, as much as the printed words twisted into his gut like a knife, he kept reading.
Words swam off the page, terrible words that painted him in unflattering lights. Words like neglectful and closed-off and moody that made him sound like he beat Drina or kept her trapped in a room by herself with no one else to love her or pay her attention. Words that made him feel dirty and angry and so so small. Words that made him feel just like Felix.
Kase wasn't Felix. Kase was nothing like that slime ball with his lies and his mistress and his bruises left on Elodie's body that she thought no one could see. Kase never laid a hand on Drina. He never raised his voice to her. Never did anything half as bad as Felix.
He wasn't an abusive boyfriend. He just forgot her birthday, okay?
So then why did this article make him feel no better than the abuser living in his house?
Giggles drew him from his panic, the innocent laughter of children ringing starkly different from the self-loathing he was spinning in his mind, reminding him that now was not the time and here was not the place to have a meltdown. He couldn't go off with these kids around. Tiny, innocent kids. Certain kids whom he loved and whom he would traumatize if he let out the scream building in the back of his throat.
Manon couldn't see him like this. Manon could not see him like this.
Kase flipped up the hood on his hoodie and ran onstage to take the side stairs up the aisle and out the door, aware that his footsteps were heavy and had drawn the attention from all the ballerinas stage left. He could feel Neelam's eyes on the back of his head, dark and heavy with worry even if he couldn't see them. He'd done this certain song and dance around her before. She knew what it meant.
"Everyone say au revoir to le petit prince!" Neelam sing-songed to the children who chorused a loud litany of au revoirs to his retreating back. Not that Kase could hear them over the ringing in his ears.
Outside, the sun hung high and bright in the sky. It was shaping up to be a beautifully clear day, the kind of day to enjoy to the fullest. Kase thought it was hateful. It should be storming. It should be pouring buckets while thunder rumbled and lighting struck the ground at his feet. That would be fitting weather, weather to match how he was feeling on the inside.
Instead, all he got were chipper bonjours as he kept his head down and walked purposefully away from the conservatory. Kase didn't know where he was headed. He had no idea why he was walking in the first place. He just knew he had to get far far away. Away from what was the question.
Kase didn't know how long he had been walking - long enough for his heel to start to chafe against the back of his shoe but not long enough to cause any cramps in his calves - when he noticed a black limousine trailing behind him. They weren't even being discreet about it, not bothering to put more than six feet of distance between the front of the car and his spot on the sidewalk.
Kase rolled his eyes. Leave it to Neelam to call in the babysitter to come and fetch him. It was probably Henri driving too, though usually he was a lot more subtle about his creeping. He wasn't a child. He could come and go as he pleased, and he didn't appreciate being spied on when he wanted to be alone.
Fuck this game of cat and mouse.
He stopped in his tracks, even more irritated when the car kept inching closer until there was no distance between them at all. The car came to stop at the curb just beside Kase, black tinted windows making it impossible to see who was inside. Not that Kase didn't already know.
Two aggressive knocks with the side of his fist against the passenger side window ought to get Gen's attention. The window rolled down at a snail's pace, but Kase's mouth was already out the gait at the first crack.
"You don't have to keep tabs on me like a fucking child - "
"Well that's good to know."
Kase's blood ran cold.
That wasn't Gen.
Kase knew that voice. He knew that voice intimately well. He hated that voice.
Against his better judgement, Kase looked at the woman through the window. She looked just like she did the last time he saw her from afar, sneaking out of the palace at three in the morning on a Tuesday, Felix not even bothering to save his little indiscretions for the weekend. Her dark hair was perfectly curled and thrown over her shoulder, little black dress clinging to all the right curves, lipstick red as a fresh kill against her tanned skin. Kase was a terrible person for still finding her beautiful. Kase was going Hell for that long-buried piece of his soul that still wanted her.
"Brayden," Kase seethed, gripping the edge of the window so tightly he was surprised the glass didn't shatter. Brayden didn't fail to notice either.
"Get in the car, Kasey. We have a lot to talk about."
Was she joking? She had to be joking. After everything she had done to him and his family, she wanted him to get in her car? But the car remained parked and she had even scooted over so that the space she had previously occupied by the window was available to him. She didn't look at him, didn't even deign to tell him twice, her sunglass-covered gaze focused on her immaculate manicure.
Kase didn't know what came over him - maybe insanity, maybe the sudden bloodlust to have her head on a spike - but he got in the car. God help him, he put himself in a moving vehicle with the most evil creature on the planet. But that didn't mean he had to like it, his fists clenched on his thighs as he kept as much distance between himself and Brayden as possible. He had to have looked like a pissed, cornered animal, but Brayden didn't seem to care. She had always had a bit too big of a flair for danger for his liking.
Silence stretched into an uncomfortable tension as the car started moving. He tried to tell himself that he was fine staring out the window and ignoring the demon seated across from him. He tried to tell himself that he could remain in control.
He was a damn liar.
"Why the hell are you in Paris? Shouldn't you be busy destroying my family?"
The words were vicious and meant to sting. Because they were for Brayden, she laughed instead. She pushed her sunglasses atop her hair, her brown eyes just as dark and cunning as Kase remembered as she rolled them in his direction.
"Felix isn't interested right now. He's obsessing over his little wifey, positively fuming about the man she's been hanging around recently. It's annoying. I'm starting to think he still loves her."
"I sure fucking hope not. She deserves better," Kase growled, staring daggers into Brayden. "And you two deserve each other."
"You don't know whether to kiss me or kill me. How sweet," she simpered with a sly smile, amused at his conflict, like she knew exactly what kind of reaction he would have by showing her face in what was supposed to be his safe space. "Come on now, we had some good times. Some really good times, if I recall."
"That was a long time ago. I might as well be a different person. You sure are."
"Don't be like that. It doesn't suit you to wallow in self-pity," she chided, a frown pulling at her surgically-enhanced lips. Only the best royal money could buy for the Prince Consort's mistress. "You upgraded after our break up too. You got yourself a princess, or at least you did before you fucked it all up. I read the exposé. Très scandalous."
Just the thought of the article made Kase nauseous. And the fact that Brayden of all people read it? That she probably laughed at it? Probably jumped on a group chat and talked about it, about him, with all her vapid, evil friends? That was too much, too much, too much.
Kase clenched his jaw so hard his teeth hurt. "You didn't come all this way to rub my breakup in my face."
"No, I came all this way to have the paps catch me out on the town, living my best life, and remind Felix what he's missing. But this...you...I might have found something even better."
Now Kase was nauseous for a whole different reason. "I'm not letting you use me to make Felix jealous. You've used me enough, don't you think?"
Brayden pouted. "When you put it like that, you make me sound so heartless."
"If the shoe fits..."
The car slowed down and pulled off to a stop. Kase didn't even know where Brayden had taken him. It didn't matter. He wanted out of this car. He could make his way back to the conservatory on his own. He just needed to get out first.
"I want you to take me to the charity dance recital."
Kase's hand stilled on the handle.
"Why on God's green earth would I do that?" he spat, unable to keep his cool any longer. Brayden had some kind of nerve asking him something like that. He also didn't like that it implied that she would be staying in Paris to haunt him for the foreseeable future.
"Because you have nothing to lose and no one around who understands you like I do," she said, her voice sweet as honey, a spider lying in wait to trap a fly in her web. A hand reached over and landed on his thigh, a tight grip digging into denim-clad skin that stung just as much as her words. "Because deep down you want to show Alexandrina what she's missing. You want to make her hurt the way you're hurting about the exposé. And well, if Felix is busy chasing after me, then it gives your sister plenty of time to chase after that governor boy toy she's so desperately in love with." Brayden leaned forward, red lips brushing over the shell of Kase's ear. Since when had she gotten so close? His skin crawled. He tried not to shiver. "Isn't that what you want, Kasey? For your sister to be happy?"
Kase jumped out of the car.
He couldn't breathe. Not with her lips on his ear and her claws in his thigh and her perfume swirling sickeningly sweet in his nose. The air outside was clearer, crisper, with the smell of asphalt and street food and the sweat of too many bodies. Kase held himself steady with one hand on the roof of the car, bent at the waist as he tried to slow his breathing and clear his mind.
Logically he knew what Brayden was selling was bullshit. There was no way in any world that taking Brayden to the recital would have a good outcome for anyone. It was a disaster waiting to happen. But a terrible, hopeful part of him couldn't help but think...Elodie could be happy. He could make Elodie happy. He hadn't made her happy in so long...
And then - and then there were nails, long nails scratching down his back in the way he used to like. A barely there pressure that used to melt all his worries away, focusing his world down to a singular thing, a singular person.
Kase's breath shuddered, his defenses failing him alongside common sense.
"Fine. I'll take you to the recital."
He cringed as soon as the words were out his mouth. He cursed his weakness. He cursed Brayden for still knowing exactly how to find them.
"Oh Kasey - " Brayden purred like the cat who got the cream. She took one step forward and he took three back.
"But this - " he cut her off mercilessly, gesturing between the two of them. " - means nothing. After the recital, I never want to speak to you again."
Brayden didn't look bothered. She pushed her oversized sunglasses back over her eyes, opened her car door, and slid inside. "Believe that if you want. But you and I? Our paths are intertwined forever."
Her door slammed shut and the car drove off, leaving Kase in the dust.