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“Exactly,” Madison implored.
Despite the conversation going on around us, the thundering of my heart, and the disbelief mudding my head, my eyes stayed on the only thing that mattered. I wished I could echo the same sentiment as Madison—that I didn’t need to know.
But I did.
“We don’t have to do this now,” Kruger told Matthew.
Matthew’s shoulders hiked toward his ears, his head turned to look at his best friend, and searing jealousy burned my insides.
Look at me. Me!
“I think maybe I do,” he said.
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.” Max backed up Kruger.
“We got your six, bro.” Jamie agreed.
“What does that mean?” Lars wondered.
“Angel, it’s just a Jamie-ism for we got his back,” Win replied.
Matthew turned, and the look on his face silenced everyone, his eyes still refusing to meet mine. “John McClaren is a Virginia state senator. Just like him,” he told everyone, gesturing toward my dad, his aversion to him crystal-clear.
“But I thought your dad was the state senator,” Wes said, looking at me.
“Each state has two,” Rory explained.
My dad nodded. “Very good, young lady.”
Frankly, I didn’t give a damn about who knew what about the state government. That wasn’t what this was about.
“John McClaren is your father?” I repeated, completely surprised.
Matthew finally met my stare, but his dark gaze was shuttered. “Yes.”
25
Prism
I never wanted it to get out.
Never wanted people to know.
Nothing but a liability. If I could put him back, I would. An insult to my gene pool.
John McClaren, my father, was embarrassed and ashamed of me. He made it clear the second he realized I would never be the trophy son a man with political aspirations should have. Instead of putting the effort into trying to fix what he thought was broken, he used his anger and disappointment to break me further.
Now, fourteen years after being discarded, abandoned… removed from the family tree, I stood here, forced to claim my lineage even though I wasn’t good enough to be family. And I had to do it in front of people I managed to carve even a small place with.
Now they will abandon me too.
The look on Arsen’s face caused an agonizing burn inside me. As if I disappointed him, somehow betrayed him. Irritation sparked inside me. But I wasn’t sure if the anger I felt was directed at him or me.
He met me in the dark. Said things I let myself believe, words I’d been desperate for that burrowed deep into my heart, braiding into the fabric of my core. So yes, I was angry, but hurt smothered it, turning it into a secondary emotion.
I was stupid. I fell too fast. Got attached when I shouldn’t have.
I knew better, but one whisper from my onyx-eyed kryptonite and I was utterly defenseless.
