His Broken Promise, My New Beginning

His Broken Promise, My New Beginning

Puffin

5.0
Comment(s)
9.7K
View
10
Chapters

I gave my brother my kidney. In return, he promised to finally bring me home. For eight years, I waited on the sidelines of his life, only to overhear him giving my "Welcome Home" party to our adopted sister. He called me a ghost he didn't know where to put, confident I'd show up and smile while she took my place. He was wrong. I didn't cry or scream; I just turned off my phone and walked away forever.

His Broken Promise, My New Beginning Chapter 1

I gave my brother my kidney. In return, he promised to finally bring me home.

For eight years, I waited on the sidelines of his life, only to overhear him giving my "Welcome Home" party to our adopted sister. He called me a ghost he didn't know where to put, confident I'd show up and smile while she took my place.

He was wrong. I didn't cry or scream; I just turned off my phone and walked away forever.

Chapter 1

Kingston Koch POV:

The party that was supposed to welcome my sister home was never really for her. I knew it, my business partner Finn knew it, and somewhere deep down, under layers of champagne-fueled excitement, even my adopted sister Everly probably knew it.

"You're making a mistake, Kingston," Finn said, his voice tight. He stood across from my mahogany desk, his arms crossed over his chest, looking more like a disapproving father than the COO of my tech empire. The late afternoon sun slanted through the floor-to-ceiling windows of my office, catching the dust motes dancing in the air between us.

I leaned back in my leather chair, steepling my fingers. "It's not a mistake. It's a strategic adjustment."

"A strategic adjustment?" He let out a short, sharp laugh that held no humor. "You promised Hope a 'Welcome Home' party. A formal introduction to the world as a Koch, as your co-heir. Now, three days before the event, you're changing the banners to 'Happy 21st Birthday, Everly'?"

"Everly was feeling insecure," I said, the excuse tasting like ash in my mouth even as I said it. "She felt like Hope's arrival was overshadowing her big milestone. You know how sensitive she is."

"I know she's a master manipulator and you let her get away with it," Finn shot back, his gaze unwavering. "This isn't about Everly's birthday, and you know it. This is about you. You're terrified of what Hope represents."

"That's ridiculous."

"Is it? Hope is your past, Kingston. She's the hurricane, the foster homes, the years you spent trying to forget. Everly is the perfect, polished daughter you and your parents chose to build a new life with. Hope is a ghost you finally caught, and now you don't know where to put her."

His words were too close to the truth, and a muscle in my jaw tightened. "I know exactly where to put her. Beside me."

"Then why are you shoving her into the corner to make room for Everly's five-tier cake and ice sculpture?" Finn stepped closer to the desk, leaning his hands on it. "She's waited eight years for this, Kingston. Eight years since you 'found' her, living in that tiny apartment, working a dead-end job, all while you promised that one day, you'd bring her home. Properly."

"And I will."

"When? When Everly gets married? When she has a baby? When will it ever be Hope's turn?" He shook his head, a look of profound disappointment on his face. "She's your blood, man. Your actual, biological sister."

"Don't you think I know that?" I snapped, the guilt a familiar, coiling serpent in my gut.

"Then act like it! You're going to lose her. You keep treating her like she's endlessly patient, endlessly forgiving, and one day you're going to push her too far, and she'll just... walk away."

A cold certainty settled over me, a confidence born from years of her unwavering devotion. I thought of her, lying in a hospital bed next to mine, pale and weak but smiling because she had saved me. "No, she won't."

"How can you be so sure?"

"She gave me a kidney, Finn," I said, my voice low. The memory was my trump card, the ultimate proof of her loyalty. "When I was dying, she didn't hesitate. She wouldn't leave me. Ever. She needs me."

I saw the flicker of pity in his eyes, and it angered me. He didn't understand the bond we had, the debt she felt she owed me for finding her, for giving her a connection to the family she'd lost.

He sighed, pushing himself off the desk. "So what's the plan? How are you going to tell her you've hijacked her homecoming for a sweet sixteen on steroids?"

"I'll just tell her we're merging the events," I said, affecting a casual tone. "A joint celebration. She's practical. She'll understand it's more efficient."

"Efficient," Finn repeated, the word dripping with sarcasm.

"She won't make a scene. That's not who she is," I continued, more to convince myself than him. "She'll show up, probably with some thoughtful, handmade gift for Everly, and she'll smile and pretend she's happy to share the spotlight." I envisioned it perfectly: Hope, in a simple, off-the-rack dress, standing quietly in the corner while Everly, glittering in couture, held court. The image brought a strange, unsettling mix of relief and shame. "She'll do it for me."

Finn just stared at me for a long moment. "I hope you're right," he said finally, his voice heavy with doubt. "Because if you're wrong, you're not just losing a sister. You're losing the only piece of your soul you have left."

He turned and walked out, the click of the closing door echoing in the cavernous office. I stared out at the city skyline, the setting sun painting the glass towers in hues of gold and blood orange. He was wrong. Hope would never leave me. She couldn't.

After all I'd done for her, she owed me her loyalty. She would stand by and watch Everly blow out the candles on a cake that should have been hers. She would clap, she would smile, and she would understand.

She always did.

"She has to," I whispered to the empty room, the confidence I'd projected for Finn now fraying at the edges, leaving me with a chilling, unfamiliar sense of dread.

---

Continue Reading

Other books by Puffin

More
Rejected for the Omega: The Alpha's Regret

Rejected for the Omega: The Alpha's Regret

Werewolf

5.0

To the outside world, I was the envy of every she-wolf as the fiancée of Alpha Kael. But inside the gilded cage of his pack house, I was a ghost. I molded myself into perfection for him, wearing the colors he liked and suppressing my own voice. Until I walked past his study and saw him with Lyra—the orphan he called his "sister." His hand rested intimately on her thigh as he laughed, telling her, "Elara is just a political necessity. You are the moon in my sky." My heart shattered, but the physical blow came days later. During a training exercise, the safety cable snapped. I fell twenty feet, shattering my leg. Lying in the dirt, gasping through the pain, I watched my Fated Mate run. Not to me. He ran to Lyra, who was burying her face in his chest, feigning terror. He comforted her while I bled. Later, in the infirmary, I heard him whisper to her, "She won't die. It will just teach her who the real Luna is." He knew. He knew she had sabotaged the rope with silver, and he was protecting her attempted murder. The final thread of my love incinerated into ash. The next morning, I walked into the Council Hall, threw a thick file on the table, and looked the Elders in the eye. "I am dissolving the engagement," I stated coldly. "And I am withdrawing my family's silver supply. I will starve this Pack until you beg." Kael laughed, thinking I was bluffing. He didn't notice the lethal Beta from the rival pack standing in the shadows behind me, ready to help me burn Kael's kingdom to the ground.

You'll also like

Sexy Behind The Mask

Sexy Behind The Mask

Ellie Wynters
4.6

She hides behind ugly suits and fake names. He's done trusting women. When they meet in a masked sex club, neither realizes they've been fighting each other across boardroom tables for eighteen months. At Taylor Industries, she's Joy Smith-the frumpy CFO who drowns her curves in shapeless polyester and wearing a wig. At home, she's the forgotten wife of a cheating lawyer who hasn't touched her in so long she's starting to wonder if she's broken. When she finds hot pink lace panties stuffed in her couch cushions...definitely not hers, it's not heartbreak she feels. It's freedom. Grayson Taylor doesn't do relationships anymore. Not after walking in on his actress fiancée with another woman. Now he channels everything into hostile takeovers and board meetings, especially the ones where his overcautious CFO fights him on every goddamn acquisition. Joy Smith is brilliant, infuriating, and funny when he pushes all her buttons. But Honey is tired of being invisible. Tired of never having felt real pleasure. So, when her best friend gives her the details of The Velvet Room-Manhattan's most exclusive masked club-she promises herself just one night. One night to find out if her husband's right, if she really is frigid, or if she's just never been touched by the right hands. She doesn't expect the masked stranger who claims her the second she walks in. Doesn't expect the chemistry that ignites between them, the way he makes her body sing, or the orgasms that leave her shaking. Doesn't expect him to hand her an email address with one command: "Only me. No one else touches you."

The Placeholder Bride's Secret Billionaire Revenge

The Placeholder Bride's Secret Billionaire Revenge

Luo Ye
5.0

For two years, I was the invisible force behind tech billionaire Kieran Douglas, convinced that our "private" romance was his way of protecting us from the tabloid spotlight. I managed his mergers, warmed his bed, and waited for a future that didn't exist. The illusion shattered at 6:00 AM when a Page Six alert debuted Kieran’s "real" romance with socialite Aspen Schneider. Before I could even process the betrayal, Kieran sent me a cold, professional text: "Order flowers for Aspen. Pink peonies. Her favorite." When I tried to walk away, my own mother called me a disgrace and threatened to lock my inheritance forever unless I married a sixty-year-old businessman to save her failing estate. At a high-society gala that same night, Aspen intentionally crushed my burned hand in front of the cameras, while Kieran stood by and dismissed me as a "mediocre assistant" who had overstayed her welcome. I stood in the cold New York rain, drenched in champagne and humiliation, realizing that every sacrifice I made for Kieran was a joke. I was a ghost in a penthouse that was never mine, discarded the moment his "soulmate" returned. To the world, I was just a placeholder whose time had run out. But Kieran forgot one thing: my father’s multi-million dollar trust fund unlocks the moment I legally marry. I didn't need love; I needed a signature and a shield. I walked into a discreet law firm and signed a marriage contract with a man I believed was the city’s most notorious, scandal-ridden playboy. I thought I was marrying a degenerate "beard" to buy my freedom and secure my revenge. I didn't realize the man who signed that paper wasn't a playboy at all, but Gaston Collins—the most powerful and dangerous man on Wall Street—and he had no intention of letting our fake marriage stay fake.

Chapters
Read Now
Download Book
His Broken Promise, My New Beginning His Broken Promise, My New Beginning Puffin Romance
“I gave my brother my kidney. In return, he promised to finally bring me home. For eight years, I waited on the sidelines of his life, only to overhear him giving my "Welcome Home" party to our adopted sister. He called me a ghost he didn't know where to put, confident I'd show up and smile while she took my place. He was wrong. I didn't cry or scream; I just turned off my phone and walked away forever.”
1

Chapter 1

30/09/2025

2

Chapter 2

30/09/2025

3

Chapter 3

30/09/2025

4

Chapter 4

30/09/2025

5

Chapter 5

30/09/2025

6

Chapter 6

30/09/2025

7

Chapter 7

30/09/2025

8

Chapter 8

30/09/2025

9

Chapter 9

30/09/2025

10

Chapter 10

30/09/2025