27. CHAPTER 27 #3
All she worked so hard to run from climbed up her throat in a throb of pain. “What did it say?”
“Rumors from intelligence sources. They were considered unfounded after investigation.” When Zayne didn't speak further, Miya knew the details of the rumors, but hated anyone else knowing her deepest secrets without admitting it to her face.
“Say it.”
“The sources claimed you weren't dead and one of your father's advisors paid a large sum of money to create a new identity for you in the database.”
His voice sounded like it came from the next room. So did hers. “Accurate.”
“They considered the claims about him worth investigating because the advisor became close with you after your mother passed.”
Surprisingly thoughtful of Zayne not to mention the man's name when Miya tried to erase it from her memory. “The claims that he marked me and raised a small fortune off me?”
“Yes.” The softness of that word didn't suit him, and Miya resented his coddling.
“Was the rest in there?”
He held her stare and nodded. “He planned to blackmail your father.”
Now Miya looked away. “He reached too high and made too many enemies. It was chaos when it all fell apart. I destroyed everything about me and disappeared for good.” His face flickered in her mind, and she focused on Zayne to see someone else. “The mark was a problem.”
“Is it still a problem?”
That was not a question of curiosity but intent. Zayne wasn't walking away if she said yes. “It's a mask. A very good one.”
“Okay.”
“You won't ask me why I never went home?” Pain slowed Miya's intuition, and the realization took longer than it should have. “Right. You already know. Ciondian spies are too good to miss that.”
Zayne didn't deny it. He knew more about her than anyone else alive right now. This wasn't the person she would have chosen to tell, but strangely, she didn't mind it being him. He looked good at carrying secrets and harboring pain. Most of all, he spared her from his pity, hiding how he felt.
“My father was vulnerable in those days,” Miya said.
Was that an excuse or an explanation? And why did she justify choosing this life when she didn't have to?
So much pain consumed her. Pain she told herself she no longer felt.
“I don't know what he needed, only that he needed it, and that he regretted the cost. His advisor just took his idea to a larger scale.”
To think that horrible man comforted her after, pretending to be a guardian and a friend. Pretending to help her leave the palace for good when he simply stumbled upon a lucrative idea.
The hidden place inside of her twisted in a fight to destroy her mind, to force her back into those days, to succumb to the frightened girl trapped there. But Zayne shifted into her line of sight, and she realized she'd looked away, lost to some void inside.
“My father also regrets a cost he once agreed to pay,” Zayne said.
“It's not the same. However, I understand softening a person's guilt.” Whatever secret Zayne spoke of, Miya understood without hearing it.
Darkness filled his eyes. “Don't forgive your father.
You don't have to go home, no matter what happens out here.”
No one knew Miya's secret, and in that isolation, fear and judgment filled the quiet. It was her first time hearing it was okay. Miya had never told herself that. And she wanted to cry.
But it had never been easier to keep her eyes dry.
He didn't judge her for staying in this life rather than running home to the palace? Miya's body relaxed, no longer prepared to flee or fight. “Did you forgive your dad?”
“I'm not sure I believe there's anything to forgive him for, even if I know there is.” Zayne looked around the room and then back to her. “You're capable of defeating Christopher and surviving him, but you don't have to. You can walk away.”
“I'm too angry.” They locked eyes, briefly connecting in the old rage she sensed within him too. “I wasn't safe in the palace or the streets. I don't want men like Christopher Garrison to be safe either.”
Zayne nodded. “Then I hope you make him suffer. If he's alive when you're done, let my friend know. They'll kill him.”
He said it so nonchalantly that it took her several seconds to understand his words. “It doesn't bother you?”
“I've killed people who don't deserve it, and they're the ones worthy of my guilt. I have no qualms about the death of bastards like Christopher. Ashantae will gladly end him.” His eyes fell to her bruised throat in the most overt sign of his disdain for the captain's abuse that he'd shown.
“I'd do it myself, but knowing Ashantae, they'll want to be the one.”
A chill crept into her bones. Ashantae sounded terrifying as well. “Thank you for your generous offer to murder someone for me. I'm not sure I can accept it, even for him.”
He placed a hand on the door. “I don't know how all of this will end, but I hope you save yourself.”
Sincerity shone in his eyes. And then he left, ending the wildest conversation of her life.
Miya clutched her robe closed tight, without any distraction to push back on the shock of all her secrets unraveling.
So, she put on the gown, and she made herself look the best she ever had, because Christopher would not get away with slaughtering innocent people in her kingdom.