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“Phantom—”
“Just do what you have to do, Rhett. I’ve got this under control.”
I pulled up at my childhood home and shut off Isaac’s car, sighing hard as I banged the back of my head against the headrest, struggling not to break down in tears.
I’d just gotten off the phone with Jace.
Samara was fine, currently curled into a ball, asleep in Jace’s bed. He promised she’d be back at the academy safe and sound sometime tomorrow morning. I was so worried about her, but that wasn’t what had me fretting and hesitating to get out of the car.
Samara knew.
Jace had no fucking problem filling me in on their gut-wrenching conversation.
Now that I knew Samara was in safe hands, it was my own misery I was wallowing in. The man who raised me was a fraud. What butchered me the most was that I was the same age as Samara when he’d abandoned her and met my mother.I just didn’t understand. No matter what his excuses would be or how hard he'd fight to justify them, I wasn’t sure if I’d ever understand.
And Samara…
I couldn’t bear to imagine how she felt after everything that’s happened to her. My agony wasn’t shit compared to hers.
If I wanted answers, I sure as fuck wasn’t going to get them by sitting in this car. So, I got out and slammed the door behind me, ready to face this shit head on like a man.
“Dad?” I hollered when I shut the front door and entered the living room.
“Basement,” he shouted back at me.
I rolled my eyes. Of course he was there. The man practically fucking lived down there since my mother died.
Making my way through the kitchen, I descended the stairs and stepped into the room, finding Father sitting down in the recliner with a large stack of papers in his lap and a glass of booze in his hand.
He turned to look back at me with a warm smile on his face. His expression withered, shifting into a worried stare when he took in my puffy cheeks and the teary film over my eyes.
“Rhett?” He got up, put his drink down, and dropped the pages down in the chair, tightening his midnight black sleep robe as he approached me. “What’s wrong?”
He paused in front of me and cradled my face. As hard as I fought to stop it, I couldn’t. The tears broke loose like a dam and streamed down my cheeks.
“Is it your brothers?” he asked, his bottom lip trembling with worry. “Samara?”
I didn’t respond. All I could do was glare heatedly into his flustered eyes.
“Fuck, Rhett, talk to me, Son! Tell me what’s going on!”
“How could you?” My voice shook. “How could you abandon Samara? Your own fucking daughter.”
He flinched back like I’d struck him and widened his eyes at me, not even trying to mask his guilt.
“I was the same age, Father. The same fucking age when you left her and came into my life. Into Mom’s.”
“Rhett,” he started, raising his hands and backing away as I took a menacing step towards him, straining not to deck him across his jaw. “You-you don’t understand—”
“YOU’RE RIGHT,” I fucking screamed at him, making him wince like a bitch and back away even further. “Idon’tunderstand. You were married to someone else. You had a kid with someone else. What gave you any fucking right to do what you did!?”
“I-I loved your mother—”
“DON’T FUCKING LIE TO ME!”
“I'M NOT,” he screeched, his raised hands now curled into trembling fists as he brought them down to his sides, finally growing the balls to approach me man to man.
“Everything I’ve told you is true. Did Ibendthe truth when you and Isaac confronted me? Yes, I did. Everything I’ve ever done since Samara was conceived has been to protect her. I didn’t even plan on meeting your mother. It just… fucking happened.”
