but when it came right down to it, I felt so bad. That wasn’t
me. That wasn’t how my mom and dad raised me. They would
have been so hurt and disappointed.” Believe me. Please,
believe me.
“You’re a liar. Now, tell me.”
Coralyn found that she couldn’t disobey. What did she have
to offer except the truth? Her eyes never broke from Giana’s
face. “I don’t know. I felt something I didn’t understand. I just
couldn’t say no. You’re the one who hit your head, but I’m not
in my right mind either.”
A scathing sigh, like Giana found her pathetic. Maybe she
did. It was probably warranted. “Were you going to tell me?
Or were you just going to keep deceiving me into thinking that
I loved you? Were you going to make me beg? Were you
going to worm your way into every aspect of my life and use it
to destroy me?”
“No! No, I wasn’t going to do that! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’ll
say it a hundred times. However you want me to say it. I’ll pay
whatever price I have to pay. I never wanted your money, and
after thinking about it, I never wanted to hurt you either. It was
only about the necklace and then it was a landslide of
everything else. And my dad—that’s not fake. All of this is
real. He’s still gone. I did get to say goodbye. He woke up
before he passed away. He told me to tell you the truth, that
everything could be fixed by admitting that you were wrong
and asking for forgiveness, and I was going to. I was trying to
figure out how. In the morning. Or the day after. I just needed
some time. I can’t think. I lost him and that’s all I can think
about. I was alone and you, no matter who you were or that it
was a lie, you said that I didn’t have to be, and I wanted that. I