Kylie Bray (Love, Hate and Billions) novel Chapter 26

She isn't donning any jewelry at the moment but my mama is without a doubt going to make a show stopper with one of her pieces that Uncle Hector so lovingly paid for last week, later on today.

A typical Christmas with this lot.

After another thirty minutes of endless chit chat with my mother and Diamond while watching in gleeful delight as my sister chopped on those peaches, I am finally done with my daughterly tasks and enjoying my third glass of champagne.

Ever heard the saying look now. When I was younger I used to stand in the same room full of the same people- my family , my friends, friends of the family, wondering if they liked me.

I have never been the pretty pageant beauty like my mother and sisters, soaking up the oohs and aah's and tenths of gossip.

I could never stand the chit chatter like my cousins and their parents did when they all got together this time of year, even if it was just small talk.

And I certainly AM not a genius like Michael so I can't really get away with excusing myself every five minutes to disappear for a few hours.

In all honesty, harsh as the reality may seem I’ve never fitted in. I am and will always be like my dad, so today for the first time, with acceptance in my mind and heart of me being an outcast I stand here with a flute of champagne in my hand asking myself if I like them all.

Truth is I actually don't and it is for the first time since I turned four, I leave the great hall and make my way outside. It is time to get my hot date and flee this place. Mama would do great on her own, she had Rae and Hector if she didn’t.

The sun has since dusted its way to almost nothing but a promise for tomorrow when I reach the almost three meter long doors hand carved with intricate tribal patterns.

“Leaving so soon.”

Three words said, three simple words that coming from anybody else would have meant nothing, but coming from that voice, that sickening yet poisonous voice that reels me in, causes shock.

My glass dropping on the floor, crashing into the tiles that have been shone for today's extravagance kind of shock.

Unable to really believe my ears, I spin around, coming face to face with the man I have hoped to never see again, Vincent Fucking Stone.

I am not going to lie and say that seeing him standing here, in his father’s house after so long doesn't cause my insides to melt, doesn't elicit waves of heat to rush up my neck.

I am going to be honest and say that I am flooded with a tirade of emotions, and those are just a few of them. The others are the hurt, rejection, pain, anger that also comes with the memories of Vincent.

Those emotions bring me an insane sense of comfort. It is false comfort. Because I know that I could never truly get over him. How can I when all I will ever get is a small whiff of a promise?

It is on this day, the 24th December as I look at Vincent Stone standing in his tux that I realize something direly important and utterly terrifying, I, Kylie Bray will always be weakened by Vincent, even if I felt stronger. Seeing him will be my kryptonite.

All these months, my heart pinching with his memory, attempts to forget him, now down the drain.

I'm facing him, he is here and I am not fine. I am his, will always be his and he will never be mine.