She didn’t respond. I almost shook her, but stopped myself before I could. Touching her would only set her off more, and that would do nothing for me.
“Where are Ga-age and Bailey?” I was unable to keep the hitch from my voice as I asked this question.
“Youhad them taken from me!” she spat. “But then, you took them from me years ago. Because of your evil, manipulative ways, they always liked you more than me.”
“Yes, I manipulated them by loving them when you couldn’t, or wouldn’t.”
“If you hadn’t been born…”
“What?” I asked when she stopped speaking. “What if I hadn’t been born?”
“I could have had a life.” She lifted a hand to run it over her soiled hair and studied her reflection in the TV. “I was pretty and popular. I could have been loved. But no man would stay with me after you. Once they realized they were with the woman who had given birth to the devil’s offspring, they left me.”
More like they left when they realized she had bats in the belfry, but I kept that to myself.
“No man would listen when I told them you were the spawn of Satan himself,” she said.
I knew the others listened in the hallway, but I didn’t hear the ruffle of a feather or an inhalation. I felt no embarrassment over what they’d heard. They knew the truth of my lineage and my mother had never tried to hide her intense dislike of me from anyone.
“Gage and Bailey aren’t the spawn of Satan, and you never loved them either,” I said, unable to bite back the words. I’d never stoop so low as to hit her as she had me numerous times over the years, but I wouldn’t be her verbal punching bag anymore either.
When her eyes slid back to me, they burned with hatred once more. “Youruinedme! It was only supposed to be a fling, yet I paid for it by having to bearyou! The entire time you grew within me, I knew you were evil.”
“I’m not evil. I’m…” I stopped speaking to take a calming breath.
It was pointless to argue with her. She would never see me as anything other than what she believed me to be. Ever since I’d learned of my heritage, I’d feared she’d always been right and that I was evil, but in that moment, I knew she was wrong; I would never be what she’d always believed me to be.
For me to lose my bond with life, I would have to take a series of steps that I never planned to take. Even if something drastic happened to push me into taking those steps, I could never be like Lucifer. I had my love of Kobal, my friends, and my brothers to keep me tied to who I was now.
“Where are Gage and Bailey?” I asked.
“I should have aborted you like I planned!”
I did a double-take as those words plunged a knife through my chest. Never, over all my years with her, had she ever said anything likethatto me. From the hallway, Kobal stepped into view. My mother was so focused on me, she didn’t notice him stalking across the room with his eyes burning molten gold.
He’d kill her if he got his hands on her, I had no doubt about it.
CHAPTER 49
River
“No!” I shouted and placed my hand against his chest to stop him. Stepping closer to my mother, I glared at her as she continued to glower at me. “Then why didn’t you?” I demanded of her. “Why did you keep me when you didn’t want me, didn’t love me, and believed me to be evil?”
Kobal wrapped his hand around my wrist. I didn’t know if he was offering me comfort or preparing to pull me out of his way. His eyes were focused on her; his claws extended. It would take only one swipe for him to sever her head from her shoulders.
The fight went instantly out of her and she slumped against the chair. “Because they told me not to,” she whispered.
I frowned at her in confusion. “Who told you not to? Your grandparents?”
Her parents had passed before I was born; she’d lived with her grandparents until they both died. I didn’t recall them, but this had been their house.
She scoffed. “They booked the appointment for me.”
Every time she opened her mouth, it felt like a new one-two combo to my gut. However, I remained standing beside her, a glutton for punishment. She’d never revealed this much before; I had to hear her out.
“Then who?” I demanded, and Kobal’s fingers tightened on my wrist.
“I was sitting in the waiting room, eager to be rid of you,” she whispered. “I knew you were wrong. It was still early in my pregnancy, yet I was exhausted all the time and so weak. Gage and Bailey never did that to me, but I felt youdrainingthe life from me.”
