“You just walked out,” I grit, fighting back the tears as I recall standing beside the man who I called father, watching my real dad walk out and leave, never looking back at me.
It shouldn’t hurt so much, but it does. Nesrin’s hand finds mine, and we tangle our fingers together. She’s tougher than I am, because I feel like breaking down, like falling to my knees and begging him to stay. So hungry for the affection of my real father, I can’t stop the lone tear from trickling down my cheek.
“I left two beautiful daughters because I couldn’t be a father.”
“You couldn’t be a father because you’re a lying cheat,” Nesrin throws back easily. “You did it to my mother, and you did it to Zaria’s father.”
He can’t deny it. There’s truth behind her words, and I can’t bring myself to speak because the lump in my throat thickens, choking me silent.
“You spent a few years with me, but I woke up one day and you were gone.” This time, she releases me and steps closer to the father we share. “I hate you, for breaking my heart, for shattering my dreams, and for what you did to me, mom, and Mallory. And most of all, what you did to Zaria.”
His gaze lifts to mine. “I’m sorry.”
“That doesn’t fix anything,” I tell him after I’ve swallowed back my pain. “It doesn’t fix the heartbreak or years of lies.” I tip my chin up, trying to exude confidence I don’t really feel. But I’ve spent my whole life faking happiness, so this time, I can fake the fire in my veins. “I spent my life portraying the perfect daughter,” I say. “But it was all a lie. You forced me to lie to everyone, even myself. For so long, I thought something was wrong with me, but now I see it has nothing to do with me.”
“I’m not a good person,” Isaac says then. “I never have been. I tried for so long to do the right thing by Nesrin, but I knew you were out there. I left her, because I couldn’t give one of my daughters something the other didn’t have. Even though you had your dad, it wasn’t me.”
“So, instead of fixing it, you broke us both?” The incredulous tone of my voice makes him flinch. “I can’t believe someone who claims to have thought of everyone but himself can ever be sorry. There’s nothing that can make this okay. Why did you marry my mother?”
The question that’s been dancing around in my mind for the past week has him staring at me with wide eyes. I remembered his face from the party, but now that I know who he is, it doesn’t make sense that he would marry her now.
“There are things that—”
“Don’t give us bullshit excuses,” Nesrin interrupts. “Why did you marry Amira? Why did you suddenly come back into Zaria’s life?”
“It can’t be because you love my mother,” I say suddenly. If he did, he wouldn’t have given up on her. Clearly, they had a relationship, that’s why I’m here. But it doesn’t make sense. If he truly felt anything for her, he would have fought for her, asked her to leave Dad.
Unless.
“You wanted the one thing my father had that you couldn’t get,” I murmur as the realization hits me. It had nothing to do with my mother. She sent me away, not realizing the man who claimed to want her, didn’t actually feel anything for her.
“He was a bastard all his life,” Isaac admits in a confident tone as the truth finally hits me right in the chest. “I hated him and he hated me.”
“It was my father’s company,” I say. “He built it from the ground up and you wanted to walk in and claim it as your own once the ink had dried on the marriage certificate.”
The door bursts open and my mother strolls in as if she owns the house. “This is enough,” she sneers angrily, her gaze bearing down on Nesrin. But it’s not my half-sister my mother should worry about.
“You know he only wants Dad’s company, right?”
Her gaze snaps to mine. But the cold, aloofness she regards me with is one of a stranger. The woman may not have been warm and maternal with me, but she was never so ice cold I didn’t recognize her.
“I think you and your friend should give this up now,” she tells me. “Your father was a good man, but he’s dead.” The callousness in her voice makes me flinch. The same man who gave her anything and everything she wanted is clearly nothing more to her than a forgotten memory. Just like me.
“How can you be such a monster?” I whisper, shock thick in my voice. The tears I’d been holding back burn my lashes, and as much as I try to fend them off, when I blink, they fall.