Page 24 of The Tower

Revelations

“What game are you playing?” I ask after I’m seated again and have taken one—actually, two—more sips of the Scotch. “Why do you even care if I can walk toward your windows?”

“It’s not me who’s playing games with you,” he says. “That would be your father.”

I want to argue out of principle, but, of course, he’s right.

“As for why I care …” He trails off with a small shrug. “The truth is, I’ve watched you for years.”

I lean back, startled by the statement.

“I’ve seen what your father has done,” he continues, his tone so icy my body feels chilled. “The mind games he’s played with you.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Has anyone ever talked to you about the way your mother died?”

“My mother?” The words feel like ground glass, and my eyes sting as I blink back tears. “Who the hell are you to ask about my mother when your father is the one who murdered her?”

“That’s a lie you shared with the entire world three years ago,” Grimm says.

I shake my head, fighting off his words. “It wasn’t a lie. I was there. I saw what happened.”

“You did, yes. But you told the world a lie.”

“You’re insane.”

He shakes his head, his words coming hard and fast like gunfire, and just as brutal. “My father is a bastard who couldn’t even buy his way into heaven and will give Satan a run for his money when he waltzes into Hell. But he didn’t kill your mother.”

His words land like a slap. Sharp. Unexpected.

“Don’t,” I whisper. “Don’t you dare.” My voice is steady, but my hands aren’t. “I saw what he did. I saw him push her. I saw⁠—”

The words break apart somewhere between memory and breath. I turn away, blinking fast. My fingers swipe at the tears before they can fall.

I don’t want to go there. Not now. Not with him.

But the edges of that day are pressing in—the roof, the scream, my mother’s body swallowed by the void. My father’s arms around me. His voice thick with tears, just like my own.

I believed him. Of course, I had. Because that was the one story that made sense. And her loss is the only thing I’ve ever shared with my father. The one thing that has ever given me even the tiniest hint of closeness with him.

Now Liam Grimm wants to tear even that from me?

I turn back, forcing the words out as tears trickle down my cheeks. “You don’t get to rewrite what happened.”

Grimm doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. Just watches me with that maddening calm. Like he knows what he just cracked open.

Like he’s waiting to see if it breaks me. But I can’t afford to crumble around this man. Not when I don’t even understand what I’ve agreed to.

That’s why he’s talking about her. That’s what his game is. To break you. To make you smaller than you already are.

“I can’t do this,” I whisper. “I don’t want your help.”

He tilts his head toward the door. “Go. I won’t stop you.”

I stand up, grab my tiny purse off the coffee table, then hurry toward the elevator. I pause just inside the vestibule to open the clutch and make sure my phone and Ruby’s credit card are still there. I can take a taxi. Or the subway. And I know Ruby’s PIN, so I can get cash.

My head pounds, and my mind keeps spinning as I tell myself I can do this.