Why did I trust Lottie with her? What the fuck is wrong with me?
“No one will know the child isn’t yours, Grayson. I’ve spent too many years on this. A small price to pay.”
“That is what you gave Lynette?” I screamed.
Your father tried that.
Josephine’s words echoed in my head, over and over and over again.
There is no getting out of this world, not alive.
She tried to warn me.
Now Snitch was dead, and I was supposed to make my peace as puppet. My child and wife were fucking gone. My little lemon. Would she have had her mother’s talent?
Gone.
Gone.
“Be on the right side of history, Grayson. A hundred-year rivalry is coming to an end,” he smiled cruelly. “And we win.”
The room blurred, watery.
The world is collapsing.
“Are you crying?” my grandfather asked, disgusted. I knew the hit that would follow that tone of voice, and welcomed it—welcomed anything other than this gnawing pain.
But steps sounded on the stairs, and the hit didn’t come.
My grandfather stepped back, annoyance tinging his face, as Charles and Keller St. Germaine came onto the floor.
“What the fuck are they doing here?” I rasped.
“They’re here to keep you company, until you decide to get back on our team. Of course, your guards are stationed at the end of your wing for company, as well. You’ll have until the Swan Swell.”
I looked between them. “The fuck is going on?”
“Did you really think while I was away, I didn’t have eyes on you?”
They weren’t there for their mother? They were his fucking eyes?
Of course, Jo wasn’t here. Just the two males, because of course my grandfather would never acknowledge Jo as anything other than a girl.
“He killed your fucking mother,” I spat.
“Oh, he speaks,” Charles said, glancing to his brother.
I lunged for my grandfather, breaking free enough to slam my fist into his jaw. In a second, I was pulled back, a vice grip around my arms.
My grandfather wiped his bloody mouth. “Don’t be a fucking pussy.” He reached down, thumbing the tears on my face, before slapping me. “You should be thanking me.”
He hit me again.
And again.
The pain was at least focused on the one spot.
I should have been there.