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My chest tightens as I wrap her in a tight embrace and hold her to me.
I almost lost her today. I came so close to getting there too late.
If Shayne had managed to sell her, she would have disappeared from the city before morning.
I can’t go through life without her.
Zoe presses her face into my chest, and her tears start all over again.
I drift my hands up and down her back, offering her the only comfort that I can right now.
There are no words to make everything better. I can’t erase her father’s betrayal or take away the pain she feels.
All I can do is hold her and help her get through this.
I’ll hold her for as long as it takes.
30
ZOE
I tuck my hands in the pockets of my black dress and glare at myself in the mirror.
There is no way that I can do this. I can't go to the funeral of a man who signed my life away, even if he was my father.
There is no forgiving what he did to me.
Ava enters the room as I reach for the zipper. “Aren’t you coming to the funeral?”
I turn around and look at her.
A lump threatens to choke me as I try to find the words to tell her that I can’t honor that bastard. He might have been horrible to me, he might have tried to sell us both. But he is still her father.
Ava knows what happened. To a degree.
She knows that I was taken by sex traffickers and that Dad arranged it all. She knows that the traffickers killed him. Everything else, I’ve kept a secret.
She doesn’t know that Dad was the one who called the traffickers and told them where to get me. He was the one who saw me in that cell and chose to walk away because his debt was paid.
It would kill her to know the entire truth. I can’t hurt my sister like that.
I’m not my father.
“I can’t, Aves,” I murmur as I unzip the dress and tug it over my head.
I toss it to the side before grabbing my robe and pulling it back on. “Not after everything he did to me.”
Ava’s eyes well with tears but she nods. “I have to go. I need the closure.”
I hug her, hissing softly as my ribs ache. “It’s fine, Aves. He was a different man to you than he was to me. He protected you.”
This is the only truth that matters. Her truth.
God knows the real truth helps no one.
Dad is dead and Shayne is dead. Nobody will be coming after her.
Telling her that Dad was going to sell her too isn’t worth the pain it will put her through. It’s a weight that I’ll bear alone.
