44. Kiera
KIERA
For a moment, the only noise in the mansion’s entryway was the patter of rain on the roof.
As soon as I met Dom’s blue eyes, her face told me everything. She knew she was caught, that a secret she’d been keeping for years had finally been revealed to Spencer. She couldn’t be sure how, but the look in her eye told me she thought it was my fault.
And I guess she wasn’t wrong.
Raising her hands to Spencer, Dom took a hesitant step forward like she was approaching a wounded animal. “I can explain?—”
“Oh, you have plenty of shit to explain. You fucking monster.” I blurted out.
Always the peacemaker, Leo took a step forward and shook her head. “We deserve an explanation, but maybe we should all cool off tonight and talk in the morning.”
“And give her time to come up with some other lie?” A part of me couldn’t believe Leo was still feeling so generous. Dom had lied to her too.
Launching forward, Spencer shook her head. “Fuck that.”
Leo was quick to push off the wall and put herself between Spencer and Dom. The only thing that could stop the rage on Spencer’s face was Major Callahan stepping in to hold her back.
Through gritted teeth, Spencer growled in Leo’s face. “Aren’t you fucking tired of being lied to?”
“Yes,” Leo nodded. “And I also want answers, not just bloody knuckles.”
Turning her attention back on Dom, Spencer barked. “You’re fucking working with Gabriel. You’re helping him traffick these fucking girls. You traitor. Secret meetings and bullshit.”
Dom stood taller. “No. That’s not what you saw.”
Something about the way the words boomed from her chest told me this was the first honest thing she’d said in a while. And from the look on Leo’s face, I could tell she was believing it too.
Even Spencer was struggling to find the words to fight it.
Pointing at her back, a spot I could only assume her sword and wings tattoo rested since I’d still yet to see it, Dom shook her head. “My honor would never let me do something so heinous.”
Spencer hissed back. “Then come clean. Now.”
First turning to Leo, Dom nodded. “I lied about working for my father because I can’t fucking stand him. We were all safer if no one knew. I didn’t want him knowing about any of you. About what I did with my free time.”
Leo tried to keep the room calm, barely accepting the answer as Spencer began to back off.
Dom’s brow furrowed as her jaw tensed. “I didn’t know about your mother until after you graduated. Long after I took you in and Violence brought you into the fold.”
Opening her mouth to fight back, Dom held up a soft hand. “Isaac is very good at covering his tracks. By the time I found out what he’d done to your mother, I knew you wouldn’t want any of my blood money. You wouldn’t want anything to do with me,”
“I thought the best way I could help was to help you build from the ashes that Isaac left. I know it sounds patronizing and shitty. But it is the truth.”
A laugh ripped through Spencer’s chest. “Real easy to act like the generous patron while sitting on top of a pile of gold. Couldn’t just give me a cut?
Had to make me bust my ass at Lucky Strike, at Glass Cannon?
Too fun to watch the poor kid grovel, huh?
Your father trafficked and sexually abused my mother, you piece of shit. ”
Dom’s head tilted in shock, her eyes an icy blue. “You know I wouldn’t do that to you. But I swear to you, this money… you don’t want anything to do with it.”
“Well, I sure would’ve,” I cut in, annoyed by Dom’s privileged bullshit. “You let me and my mother get kicked out on our asses. Never came to help me, did you? No, instead, you tried to do it again. Tried to send me back to that abusive asshole. And you knew how terrible he was.”
Shaking her head, Dom got heated again. “No, Kiera. That isn’t true. I was trying to get you extracted, trying to get The Oracle to protect you. I wanted you far from all of this.”
The rain was coming down harder now, pounding the roof overhead as I raised my voice with a scoff. “Sounds like you’re quite the hero, since you deigned to save poor little Spencer and me.”
“A hero?” Dom snarled back, moving closer to me now.
She towered over me as she hissed in my face.
“I’m no fucking hero, Viper. My hands are soaked in the blood of hundreds of the innocent lives my father ruined.
What little agency I’ve had over my life, I’ve used to help as many of his victims as I could.
Every ounce of power I have, I clawed from his grasp.
I’m no fucking hero. But I’ll be damned if I let him turn me into a monster. ”
I couldn’t stop myself from rolling my eyes. Too late for that.
All I’d seen since I’d arrived at this mansion was Dom’s shitty attitude and rudeness. She was unwelcoming, cruel, and overly secretive.
She’d cornered me into the counter. I had to fucking bite her to get away.
“Grow up, fucking martyr bullshit.” I scoffed as I crossed my arms.
But my words incensed her. Fury took over her face as she stepped toward me. “You ungrateful bitch.”
“I’m ungrateful? Oh, please, spare me the theatrics, Dom.” The name felt odd on my lips now, my brain oscillating between the Madeline I knew and the Dom that stood in front of me.
But as she hissed in my face, I knew exactly who I was dealing with. “You have no idea what I did to save you, Kiera.”
And I couldn’t stop myself from roaring back. “Then fucking tell me!”