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“You’re truly your mother’s daughter,” my father snarled.
My stomach clenched. He’d used the same expression before. Though I never gave it much meaning.
Maybe I should have.
“You think I let you run around, whore around, undermine my reputation? I should’ve thrown you and your mother out the second I learned you weren’t mine. The second I learned she’d deceived me.”
A coldness hit my core and expanded until my whole body felt shaky and weak. The world suddenly felt frozen, my brain lethargic, as if it couldn’t actually catch on to what he was saying.
And his eyes.
So cold. So dismissive.
As if I wasn’t much more to him than the dirt under his shoes.
Not his.
I sucked in a breath. There was a strange ringing sensation in my ear, which I tried to dislodge by shaking my head.
I wasn’t his daughter? My mother had an affair?
I opened my mouth and closed it again. And watched as my father looked at me once more. He shook his head, then passed by me as if I was invisible. Just as I’d felt my whole life.
And now I knew why.
I could feel myself smiling, which was an odd thing to do, but somehow, on some level, it all made sense now.
My eyes fell on my phone, and I grabbed it and shoved it into the pocket of my hoody.
Then I turned and watched my father face the tank. “That doesn’t mean she’s not part of the deal. She’s officially my daughter. And the deal stands,” he said to Zotov in a jovial tone that made me sick to my stomach.
And Zotov? He stared over my father’s shoulder, directly at me with a blank mask, no emotion visible. He held my gaze, and whatever he saw, whatever he was thinking after this revelation, he kept it to himself.
No empathy. No mercy.
This would be my life—if I let it.
“This is not the deal,” I heard myself say.
My father shot around. “Shut your mouth.”
I laughed. My laughter sounded scary—even to my own ears—on the verge of insanity.
“I’d rather die than be married to someone like you.”
I did see it coming, but he swung his arm so fast, his hand connected before I could brace myself. The force behind it was incredible. My whole body went sideways, and I couldn’t prevent my head from crashing into the desk. And then everything went black.
When I came to, I opened my eyes and stared at the ceiling. I was back in my room. On my bed.
But not alone.
I turned my head to the side and did a swift check-in. Seemed like everything was still working.
“Didn’t expect you to be such a lightweight,” a dark voice said.
I froze. I wasn’t alone. Then the voice registered. The accent. Zotov.
I searched the room and then sat up, which caused a throbbing in my temples and a sick feeling in my stomach.
