But that night, everything Aiden thought he knew was challenged.
His phone rang—James, his best friend, sounding panicked.
"Aiden, where are you?"
"At Kieran's. Why?"
"Don't freak out, but your parents hired a private investigator to look into Kieran. And they found... things."
Aiden's stomach dropped. "What kind of things?"
"Can you come to my apartment? I think you need to see this in person."
Aiden looked at Kieran, who'd heard the entire conversation with vampire hearing. "Go," Kieran said quietly. "Hear what they found. I won't hide from the truth."
At James's apartment, Aiden found not just his friend but his parents, looking devastated.
"Sit down, honey," Sophia said.
"What's going on?"
Richard pulled out a folder, thick with documents and photographs. "We hired someone to investigate Kieran Ashford. And what we found... Aiden, this man is dangerous."
He spread the contents across the table. Photographs—old photographs, dating back decades—showing Kieran at various events. Looking exactly the same in photos from 1990, 1970, 1950, 1920.
"He doesn't age," Richard said. "These photos span over a century, and he looks identical in all of them."
"There's more," Sophia added. "We found death certificates. At least five different identities, all with Kieran's face, all supposedly dead. He's been faking his death and reinventing himself every few decades."
"And the people around him," Richard continued, pulling out more documents. "Associates who disappeared. Business partners who died under mysterious circumstances. A pattern of people getting close to him and then vanishing."
Aiden's hands shook as he looked through the evidence. It was damning—too much to be coincidence.
"He's not human," James said quietly. "Whatever he is, he's not normal. And Aiden, I found something else." He pulled up his laptop. "Missing persons reports. Over the past century, several young men matching your description—same age range, similar features—disappeared after being seen with someone matching Kieran's description."
"No," Aiden whispered. "That's not—he wouldn't—"
"Honey, we know you care about him," Sophia said gently. "But you need to face the possibility that he's been manipulating you. That this whole relationship has been—"
"Has been what? A lie? A trick?" Aiden stood abruptly. "You don't know him. You don't understand—"
"Then help us understand," Richard said. "Because from where we're sitting, you're involved with a man who's either immortal or has been assuming the identity of dead people for over a century. Either option is terrifying."
Aiden looked at the evidence again. At photos showing Kieran through the decades, unchanging. At documents suggesting a pattern of deaths around him.
Was it possible? Had Kieran been manipulating him? Using the story of past lives and soul bonds to make Aiden trust him, love him, agree to become like him?
"I need to talk to him," Aiden said.
"Absolutely not," Richard said firmly. "If he's dangerous—"
"He's not dangerous. Not to me."
"How do you know?"
Because my soul knows him, Aiden wanted to say. Because I've loved him for a thousand years even though I don't remember it.
But looking at his parents' terrified faces, at James's concern, at the overwhelming evidence of Kieran's strange existence, doubt crept in.
What if the soul bond was a lie? What if Kieran had been creating an elaborate fiction to trap him?
"I need to talk to him," Aiden repeated, and left before they could stop him.