Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 72480 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 362(@200wpm)___ 290(@250wpm)___ 242(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72480 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 362(@200wpm)___ 290(@250wpm)___ 242(@300wpm)
“I couldn’t because you killed him! I didn’t even have the chance to get to know him!” I yell. “I never even knew he was my real father. Until it was too late.”
My father’s face darkens. “No one misses that old fool, and you shouldn’t either. He didn’t deserve you.”
“Oh, but you do?” I scoff. I can’t believe this.
“Apparently not enough for you not to want to wish me dead,” he retorts, staring me down.
A pang of guilt shoots through me as I watch him move with his wheelchair. It’s only then that I notice one of his hands doesn’t move quite like it’s supposed to … And half his face doesn’t appear to work either when he talks.
“What happened to you?” I ask, curiosity overtaking me.
“What do you think?” he asks, parking himself in the middle of the room, right in front of me. “What do you think happens to a person’s brain when the body is drowning?”
A lump forms in my throat, and no matter how many times I try swallowing, it won’t go away.
“When my car hit the water thanks to your sudden attack, I lost consciousness. While you were being rescued by your knight in shining armor, I lay there in the water, dying.”
I shake my head. “They couldn’t find you.”
“Because my own men had already dragged me out by the time your precious Marcello even had the guts to come looking!” His voice is filled with pain. “Now I’m in this chair for life.”
When the pain becomes too much to look at, I look away.
“LOOK AT ME!”
The sheer rage in his voice forces our eyes to lock.
“You’re looking at a man who can’t ever walk again. All because you couldn’t just stay quiet and be a good girl until we got home,” he mutters, shaking his head as much as I am. “You did this to me.”
“No …” I murmur, but I know he’s right.
I did.
I was the one who wrapped my hands around his neck, hoping to stop him from dragging me back to a place I didn’t want to go. Hoping that I could fix the mistake I’d made by coming along for the ride while Marcello was defending his property. Hoping that I could make Frank pay for what he’d done to my real father.
And I knew then that it would come back to bite me in the ass.
Because I am guilty.
I tried to kill him.
“Good thing you didn’t succeed.” Suddenly, Molly comes waltzing back inside, and she stands behind him, clutching the wheelchair’s handles with confidence and pride.
My eyes widen. “So you … knew?”
She doesn’t seem surprised one bit. “Of course, I knew what you’d done to my sweet darling. Do you think my own people wouldn’t tell me what happened to my husband?” She snorts. “You’re too gullible and naïve, Harper. No wonder you ended up in Marcello’s hands.”
My muscles tighten at that remark. “So all that time, you were just being nice to me to trick me.”
“Trick you?” She raises her brows. Frank reaches up to grab her hand, and the two share a moment like he needs to calm her down because she’s been offended or something.
“Your mother has tried to ease you into the idea of staying, but you refused to play the good daughter,” Frank says.
“Look, I’m sorry for what I did—”
Frank raises a trembling hand. “Stop. I don’t need your excuses.”
“What we need is our daughter back,” Molly adds.
I hold my breath, unsure of how to respond.
“And we’ll do anything to make it happen,” she says, lowering her gaze as though she wants to show she means it.
No wonder she locked me up in here.
If she can’t have me by being nice, she’ll do it by force instead.
“So you’ll have me hate you instead,” I say.
“If that’s what it takes,” Frank responds.
My face turns sour. “Then I take it back. I’m not sorry.”
He smiles at me like some twisted motherfucker. “It doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is that you failed.”
That hits me hard.
“Because not only did I survive … but you’re also in Irish hands now. And that was my goal all along.”
Frank looks up at Molly, who gazes down at him lovingly before leaning over to press a kiss to his forehead, and it makes me nauseous.
But then she glares back up at me along with Frank, both of them instilling a certain kind of fear that not even Marcello could make me feel.
“All we need to do now …” Frank balls his only properly working hand into a fist. “Is to destroy Marcello.”
Marcello
Claudio’s voice interrupts my workout. “You’re not going to like this.”
I place the dumbbell on the floor and sit up. My head is pounding from the effort. I’ve been in the gym for more than two hours now, and my whole body is screaming with exhaustion.