51. Daphne
51
“I am going to respectfully insist—again—that we get back in the car and drive back to the penthouse.” Lev aims his worried stare at me. “We were never here. Your husband doesn’t have to know.”
“I’m not here to keep secrets, Lev.” I offer a small smile. Then I look to the decrepit manor looming in front of us. “I’m just… going home.”
“You and I both know it’s a trap.”
I blow out a long, heavy sigh. “I know. Which is why I’m going to give you this.” I hand him the burner cell, freshly charged and turned on.
Lev doesn’t look away from me, but his frown deepens.
“Keep it on,” I say. “You’ll be able to hear everything that goes on in there, okay? And if there’s any trouble at all, you come get me out. Whatever it takes.” I meet his eyes with steely resolve in my own. “I’m going to return to my daughter tonight. I won’t have it any other way.”
He sighs as he accepts the phone from my hand, a call between it and mine still active.
“If it goes silent,” he warns before I turn to leave, “I’m coming in. Scream or no scream, I’m following my gut.”
“I know, Lev.” I pat him on the shoulder. “I appreciate you more than you could ever know.”
Then I start the walk.
The manor is vastly different from what I knew as a child. The gardens are dried up, the grass wild and unkempt, and rot has begun to creep up the tree trunks like the ground itself is poison. My parents used to invest thousands of dollars in landscaping alone, just to make sure everyone who drove by knew how successful and influential they were.
The past tense is the important part there. Were. Used to. Things have changed now.
I don’t bother ringing the doorbell or knocking. They know I’m coming.
I walk into the main foyer and stifle my gasp of horror. I never expected to see so much dust, so many cobwebs, so much broken beyond repair.
But maybe this is the truth no one wanted to see.
That everything was just for show. On display to entertain.
Including the daughters they raised here.
I hear footsteps. My mother emerges from the corridor. When she sees me, her eyes raise—at least as much as decades of Botox and facelifts will allow them to—and then whips around and goes right where she came from.
Then: voices. More footsteps. Two pairs this time, growing louder and louder until both of my parents reappear.
They look frumpy, dirty in ways I can’t quite explain. Worn down at the edges. Like the trees outside, they’re rotting from the trunk.
My father strides toward me, lips puckered to nearly nothing. When he’s close enough, I start to speak. “Dad, I?—”
The crack of his backhand across my face echoes in the cold entryway. The sound of it is the only warning I get before the pain sets in.
And the floor rises up to catch me.
Stewart leans over me where I fell, red in the face and foaming at the mouth. “You don’t get to whore yourself to some poor excuse of a mobster and then act like you have the high ground. What you do, you selfish little bitch, is whatever I fucking tell you to!”
I wobble to my feet while he spews his tirade. My face still stings like crazy, and I’d be lying if I said he’s not scaring the shit out of me with how unhinged he’s become.
But more than scared, I’m pissed.
Really.
Fucking.
Pissed.
“So you know what?” He laughs darkly. “I’ve decided on how you can pay us back for everything you’ve done. Since you love spreading your legs so much, you’ll be?—”
I don’t give him the dignity of a returned backhand.
I punch him right in the jaw.
Ophelia screams and catches him as he stumbles back. Stewart sputters blood, and when he touches his nose, I see the way his fingers tremble.
Good.
“I came here to talk.” I pivot my stance and sink into the fighting position Sofi taught me. Elbows in, chin tucked behind my fists, eyes level. “But if you want to put hands on me, I’ll return the favor.”
“This is ridiculous! Both of you!” Ophelia squeezes his arm. “She is our daughter, Stewart! We are family!”
“You stopped being my family the first time you tried to sell me,” I spit in disgust. “I was what, eight? How much would that have brought you if it actually went through?”
She rolls her eyes. “Stop making it sound so terrible! All we did was pair you up with a successful, stable business associate who would have given you the world once you were old enough! And honestly, I can’t believe you’re still bringing that up?—”
“I was eight! I was a child!” I glare at her. At both of them. “Do you even hear yourself? How sick and fucked in the heads you both are?”
“Maybe it’s because you made us this way, you ungrateful slut!” Stewart spits at my feet and takes a step toward me despite his wife clinging to him. “Everything we’ve done has been for you! For you! We tried with your sister, but she was even worse than you! At least you could be grateful for the sacrifices we made!”
I thought Lev would have come in by now, but I’m kind of glad he hasn’t yet. I have a few things to say before this all goes too far south to salvage.
“So what you’re telling me is you’re delusional.”
Stewart barks a laugh. And then just… keeps laughing. And laughing.
It’s deeply unsettling.
“I am! I must be!” He slaps his hands to his chest. “How else could anyone describe my constant attempts to keep this family together? To give us the best life possible? Hell, I betrayed my own boss just to make sure everyone could enjoy life in the lap of fucking luxury—and this is the thanks I get?”
I frown at him. Even Ophelia takes a step away from him. “Stewart? What are you talking about?”
Again, he laughs. “What the hell do you think I’m talking about, woman? What, did you think Kostya Chekhov fired me for no reason? He was dead! And I helped pull the trigger!”
I feel like something just punched me in the gut. “You… wait, what?”
“It’s how I know his son is no good for you. I swear to you, Daphne, I know what that man is like. What all those Chekhovs are like. Kostya couldn’t keep it in his fucking pants, and he was a complete jackass even without doing his best friend’s wife on his desk! So yeah, I turned him in! And I got an incredible payout for helping his rival take over the company. Who the hell do you think paid for our vacation to Mykonos that year?”
My brows are firmly wedged along my hairline. I don’t think they’ll be coming down any time soon. “You… You aren’t joking. You seriously did that. You got Kostya killed.”
“I did the world a fucking favor. Just like I’ve been trying to do you the favor of making sure his bad seed doesn’t taint our family.” Stewart takes a calming breath and holds up a hand. “Yes, I know, you’ve already given birth to his child. We can overlook that. You just have to leave him and his world behind, okay? No one needs to know your daughter is a bastard. She can be… well, it actually works out that Conrad is dead. People won’t pry.”
I’m going to throw up. “You can’t be serious.”
“The Ewings need an heir,” Ophelia softly chimes in. “We’ve already spoken with them. They’re willing to overlook everything and they’ll give her a comfortable life?—”
“You cannot be serious.”
I must be asleep and having a horrific nightmare, because I did not just hear my own parents say they’re giving my baby away to some strangers I don’t even like.
“It’s the only way. Once that baby is out of the picture, you’ll have options! Just like your father said!”
They’re insane. They’re both clinically insane. That’s the only explanation for all of this.
“Alright. You know what?” I put my hands up in mock surrender. “I came here to make peace. To negotiate so you two will stop while you’re ahead. But clearly, you need actual professional mental help. This is… I’m out.”
Thank God I got all that on the burner phone, though.
The one that’s in the car, recording everything.
“What we need, Daphne, is for you to be here with us. Supporting us. Restoring us.”
“Absolutely not.” I take a few steps closer to the door. I don’t know if Lev fell asleep or is on his phone with Pasha, but this is definitely an increasingly unsafe situation. “I am going to go now. You have a?—”
The door slams open behind me.
Oh, thank God. Lev’s finally joining this shit show.
But when I move to turn and greet him, I’m grabbed by my waist and yanked against a sweaty, smelly, much older man…
Who presses a gun to my forehead.
“Take a single step,” he snarls at the Hamishes, “and I’ll blow her fucking head off.”
I swallow hard. My mouth tastes like acid.
“Now, now, Scott.” Stewart suddenly sounds so calm and collected. The shift is jarring. “Let’s not be foolish.”
The disgraced senator chuckles in my ear and pulls the gun away. “You know what? You’re right. No sense blowing her pretty head off before I make her blow mine, if you know what I mean.”
Yup. I’m gonna puke all over the marble floor. I’ve always hated the pattern, anyway.
“But before I do…”
He levels the gun at Stewart’s face.
“You’re going to give me one good reason why I shouldn’t pull this trigger.”