Cherreads

Chapter 1 - before they met

Keifer was born into a family people only whispered about.

Not because they were untouchable.

But because they were too perfect to belong to real life.

The Kaizer mansion rose at the edge of the city like a private kingdom — wide gates, marble corridors, glass ceilings, and quiet halls that carried generations of power and pride. It wasn't just a house. It was a legacy.

Inside that palace lived a family that never knew how to love quietly.

Kaizer — the man everyone feared in business and respected in silence — was nothing like that at home.

With Serina beside him, warm-smiled and sharp-eyed, the mansion breathed life instead of cold luxury.

And in the middle of it all… stood Keifer.

The heir everyone watched.

The son everyone trusted.

The boy everyone believed would never fall apart.

Keigan, his first younger brother, followed him everywhere like a shadow, loud, reckless and endlessly loyal.

Keiren, the second, was quieter — observant, dangerously intelligent, always seeing things before anyone else dared to.

John, Kaizer's younger brother, ruled the left wing of the mansion with laughter and stubborn discipline.

Stella softened every sharp edge he carried.

Their children — Karina, bright and bold, and Karim, gentle and curious — turned the palace halls into something that felt less like a fortress and more like a home.

They were rich.

Unquestionably powerful.

Unbreakably close.

A healthy family.

A perfect family.

At least… that was how the world saw them.

No one ever asked what kind of boy grows up inside a palace that teaches him how to rule —

but never how to lose.

And no one imagined that a girl named Jay would one day walk into this flawless, untouchable world…

…and quietly become the only thing Keifer could never control.

Jay had only one person in her entire world.

Her father.

No warm dinners filled with voices.

No crowded hallways.

No cousins running through a palace.

Just one man… and a quiet, expensive house that never truly felt like home.

Jay's father was rich — not quietly rich, not newly rich — but powerful in the same circles that ruled the city.

The kind of man whose name was spoken carefully in boardrooms.

And more importantly…

He worked closely with the Watsons.

The Watson family didn't treat him like an outsider.

They treated him like an equal.

Business partners.

Strategic allies.

Families tied by contracts, shares, and silent promises.

But Jay never cared about any of that.

All she ever knew was this—

While Keifer grew up surrounded by voices, laughter, siblings and warmth…

She grew up learning how to be enough for only one person.

Her father.

And somehow…

that difference would become the very thing that pulled her into the heart of the Watson mansion.

Into Keifer's life.

Into a love neither family had planned.

More Chapters