“You were there. You…” I can’t say it. The words won’t come out of my mouth. Claudia’s wrongful imprisonment proves traffic accidents aren’t always as they seem, but still, this is too shocking to articulate.
Dimitri doesn’t face the same issues as me. He has no trouble spelling things out as he sees them. “Not only did your mother attempt to sell you when her stash got low, she killed her only siblingandher mother with the hope of a big payout. It will take a few days for preliminary reports to come back, but I won’t be shocked to discover your grandfather didn’t die of natural causes.”
I shake my head, too stunned by the honesty in Dimitri’s tone to make sense of it.
“Killing my nanna wouldn’t help my parents. If they wanted money, they would have needed to take me out as well.”
When I say that to Dimitri, he presses his lips to the shell of my ear and growls, “They didn’t want money…” His pause is the worst form of torture “They needed space. Space you gave them when you moved into a one-bedroom flat in the middle of the burbs.”
I’m confused as to what he means until my wide-with-terror eyes collide with my mother’s. She’s wearing the same smug glare she wore when Uncle Mike’s lawyer informed us he forgot to change his will when he married. When he died, all his assets went to my mother. Although he wasn’t a wealthy man, he lived more comfortably than my parents. They thought they had hit the motherload when their bank balance rose by six digits.
“What did she need space for?” Although I’m asking questions, I don’t need Dimitri to answer me to get the gist of what’s happening. It’s staring me straight in the face, eating away my morals as much as drugs stole the life of the woman kneeling in front of me.
“Was it for farming?” I don’t mean to plant potatoes, tomatoes, or zucchini. I’m talking about the farms Dimitri mentioned during our talk before we came to the basement, the ones I can’t forget no matter how hard my twisting stomach wishes I could.
If my intuition is true, if my parents are knee-deep in the industry responsible for Fien’s captivity, this is worse than them switching a product mid-sale. They’re selling babies for crying out loud—stolen-from-the-womb babies.
When I spot Dimitri’s nod in the corner of my eye, I want to fold in two. The only reason I don’t is because I have more pressing matters to attend to. It isn’t just my mother’s life at stake anymore. Mine is on the chopping block too.
“You need to tell him who you work with andthat I’m not involved.” The last half of my sentence is voiced more punchily than the first half. I’m not just desperate to save my hide, I don’t wantanyonethinking I’m associated with such a callous, cruel world, much less Dimitri.
“Tell him!” I scream when my mother’s silence works me over as well as Dimitri’s hand pummeled her face. “For once, protect me as you should have when I was a child. Put me first for a change!” Blinded by a rage too hot for me to think rationally, I curl my index finger around the gun Dimitri directed at her head. “Tell him! Tell him now!”
“I don’t know who they are,” she chokes out on a whimper, shocked I’m treating her as poorly as she treated me my entire life. “We didn’t exchange names. We weren’t a part of the production side. We were just… we…”
“Were a dumping site,” Dimitri fills in when words allude her.
I never thought I would have a wish to kill someone, let alone the ability, but it’s a close call when my mother bobs her head at Dimitri’s claim. She isn’t a victim like I believed during my childhood. She’s as bad as my father and just as abusive, and once again, I’m done playing nice.
Two
Dimitri
When I entered this room hours ago, my first thought was that I should crush Roxanne’s windpipe as Smith’s whispered words crushed my soul. I should destroy her as her parents destroyed me. At one stage, I even considered keeping her parents alive so they could witness me torture their child as they had mine.
None of my previous suggestions are being considered now.
Despite my intuition begging me to reconsider, I don’t believe the anger blistering out of Roxanne is a ploy. Just like earlier tonight, she’s prepared to slay for me by killing her own blood. If that can’t convince me she’s on my team, nothing will.
Audrey was taken as her replacement. She was kidnapped purely to fill the slot Roxanne’s absence caused, but for the life of me, I can no longer place the blame for that on Roxanne’s shoulders.
I looked away.
I fucked up.
This isn’t Roxanne’s fault.
In all honesty, Roxanne is so under my thumb, if she had the opportunity to switch places with Fien, she would in a heartbeat. I have no doubt about that. It isn’t just men who are led by their libidos. Women are just as bad. The way Roxanne stared at me in the alleyway all those months ago is proof of this.
There’s just one difference between her and women like my wife.
Some sit back and watch the shit unfold.
Others get into the nitty-gritty.
Roxanne is the latter.
The way she put her life on the line earlier tonight proves that as does the obvious twitch of her index finger. It’s curled around the trigger of my gun, ready to be pulled back. She’s just waiting for permission.
