Chapter 87
Quill
Escalation
The Search (Originally Performed by NF)
Karaoke Instrumental Version
Hit The Button Karaoke
Davian’s car skidded across the gravel in the driveway as if we were in a car chase, and I heard the stones hitting the cars belonging to Joseph, Lorette, Brittany, and… Tony.
Davian and I jumped out of the car at the same time, while Lara and my brother turned to look at us, their faces etched with shock.
“What the...”
Tony bent down to his car, where a somewhat larger stone had just left a visible dent.
“Dad?”
Davian jerked his head from Tony to his daughter, staring at her before letting his darkening gaze shift to my brother.
By now, my brother had spotted me and was eyeing me as if I didn’t belong here. And I didn’t.
“Tony,” Davian growled, annoyed. “What’s my daughter doing here?”
“I wanted to pick something up for work. She wanted to come along quickly and then have coffee…” He paused, looking back and forth between us. “What the hell are you doing here?”
Davian’s hands clenched into fists while Tony and a still-shocked Lara looked back and forth between us.
“Davian? Quill?”
Davian didn’t hesitate any longer, slammed the car door shut, causing Lara to flinch, and hurried down the gravel path. He was picking up speed, so I looked apologetically at my brother and – my heart racing – rushed after Davian.
“Davian!” Tony called after us.
“Dad?”
I heard footsteps behind us, but when Davian was already heading up the stairs to the large terrace, I blocked everything out, determined to get Davian away from here.
“Davian, wait.” I caught up to him, grabbed his arm, but he kept walking, with a look that multiplied my panic tenfold. “Please… This isn’t a good idea…”
“Not a good idea?” He sounded like a madman. “You know what wasn’t a good idea?” His jaw looked like it was about to pop out. “Believing for even one second that you would ever have been safe at this damn university without me!”
“I’m fine. Davian, please…”
He sped up, forcing me to let go of him.
“Davian!” I heard Tony yell somewhere behind us in the park, but I followed Davian through the open door into the foyer at the back, where Lorette, dressed in exotic fashion, stopped with a confused look on her face and stared at Davian.
“Davian? What a pleasant…”
He ignored her, darting past her.
That was the moment she spotted me, and the smile that had just been trying to find its way onto her face faded.
I ignored her, too.
“Davian…”
But it was too late.
He was already entering the salon, where my father was pouring himself a whiskey with trembling hands.
Golden Wounds
Ahmet Kenan Bilgic, Turgut Mavuk
“A goddamn letter opener?!”
The man who had made my life a living hell spun around, looked at Davian in surprise at first, until he spotted me and his expression hardened.
I came to an abrupt halt in the wide double doorway and stared back.
I should never have come back here.
“Goddamn it! She’s your daughter!”
Davian, who had stopped in the middle of the salon, stared at my father as if he were about to do things to him that would land him in prison.
I couldn’t lose him.
Panic, the likes of which I had never felt before, began to tighten around my throat.
“What is he talking about, Joseph?”
Lorette cautiously entered the salon. Behind her, Lara and Tony rushed in.
“Dad…,” Lara said anxiously, and I swallowed, wanting to get out of here, wanting to get Davian out of here.
He suddenly pointed his finger at me, glaring at my father with a look of utter contempt.
“She’s the woman you’re supposed to protect with your life! You rotten bastard!”
Before he’d even finished the sentence, he stormed toward my father, who set down his glass and tried to dodge, but ended up getting hit right in the face by Davian’s fist and – crouching down and holding his nose – staggered backward.
Lorette let out a gasp of horror, and Brittany, who had also appeared in the salon, covered her mouth with her hand.
“Dad!” Lara blurted out in shock, but Davian ignored her, not waiting for Joseph to straighten up, but storming toward him, grabbing him by the collar, and swinging his fist.
My father ducked, broke free, and stepped back with his hands raised.
“Davian, calm down.”
But Davian swung again and hit his left cheek, so that my father actually took cover and – holding his bleeding nose – stepped backward around the sofa.
“Oh my God!” Lorette gasped.
“Davian.” My father raised both hands. “I’m asking you…”
But Davian stormed around the sofa without hesitation, threw himself at my father, dragged him to the floor, and beat him uncontrollably.
“Davian, damn it!” Tony shouted, rushing forward and trying to pull Davian away. To no avail.
“Dad, please!”
Pure panic filled Lara's voice.
And me? I felt trapped. Paralyzed. Just like back then. Like when Papa had thrown dishes at Mama.
I wanted to hide, wanted this to stop, even though the crack of my father's nose should have given me satisfaction.
It didn't. It fueled my fear. For Davian.
“Davian!” Lorette whimpered, while Brittany looked just as paralyzed as I felt.
Tony finally managed to yank him backward, and both of them fell to the ground, so my father had a chance to crawl away, get down on all fours, and pull himself up on a dresser.
His face, smeared with blood.
“Oh my God, Daddy!”
Brittany rushed over to him and helped him to his feet.
“You lousy traitor!”
Davian tried to get back up and charge at him again, but this time Tony managed to hold him back.
“I hate you!”
Davian struggled violently.
Blood was splattered across his face, while veins stood out on his temple.
“I hate you for everything you’ve done to her! Let go of me, Anthony!”
“No!” my brother growled, straining. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Let go of me, damn it!”
The feeling of turning to a pillar of salt while my father looked at me as if he wished I would die on the spot made my knees go weak.
He straightened up, adjusted his shirt collar and the cufflinks on his shirt sleeves before looking back at Davian with a shake of his head.
“Just look at yourself. What she’s done to you.” He snorted in displeasure. “How she’s clouded your judgment, just to ruin me.” He slipped out of Brittany’s worried grip, strode past Lorette, and reached for his whiskey before taking a long gulp. “It’s a shame you fell for it.”
The pounding in my chest was deafening. As if it feared the tension hanging over this room.
Unpredictable. Everything about this was unpredictable…
My father turned toward me, and only then did I realize that there were only three meters between us.
Davian must have noticed it too, because he tried to pull away immediately, but Tony’s grip was too tight.
“Is that what you wanted, Onera?”
He stepped toward me, slowly, the way he liked to do. And it made the blood in my ears roar.
“For a man to beat me up for you?”
He raised both eyebrows and the right corner of his mouth.
All I could do was stare at all the blood.
“Or are you planning something because you actually think you have a chance in this game?”
This wasn’t the man who had made me feel his unbridled rage all these years.
This man wasn’t acting on unpredictable impulses.
No. This man wasn’t himself anymore. He was desperate.
An animal that had been cornered. One that spent every spare second plotting its escape.
Yet he hadn’t fled, which could only mean one thing: he had a plan.
All because I had hesitated…
I should have exposed him, but then he would have held too much leverage over Davian and me.
My heart skipped a beat.
If I were to reveal my true identity before the legal elite, he would have no reason left to stop him from exposing Davian to the public. Or from using the legal system to punish me for what I had done…
Until a few months ago, I hadn’t been afraid of anything. I had been a nobody, had had no one.
Now I had Davian. And if it came out that I had enrolled under a false identity, they would separate me from him. For years…
Something in my chest tightened more and more violently, constricting my lungs.
My father gave me a sly grin, and a chill ran down my spine.
He knew I couldn’t just rat him out.
“Touch her and I’ll snap your neck!”
“Davian!” Tony snapped at him. “Father! What the hell is going on here?!”
First Day in Court
Atli ?rvarsson
“Oh.” My father took his time to bury me with his gaze before raising the glass to his lips, taking another sip, and then turning to Tony and Davian. “Hasn't your friend told you yet that he’s hiding your sister under his roof, where the two of them are screwing?”
Lara’s eyes widened, almost as much as Brittany’s.
But it was Tony who had my full attention. I could literally hear the gears turning in his head. Or was it the lump in my chest that was slowly threatening to shut down?
“What are you talking about, Father?”
Joseph just laughed dryly and drank some more, while Davian stared him down, still trying to break free.
“What is he talking about, Davian?”
Remorse welled up inside me.
This shouldn’t have happened.
Then Tony looked at me.
“Gravia?”
The apology must have been written all over my face, just like the despair, because I couldn’t hold his gaze, instead looked at Davian, also apologetically, which didn’t seem to interest him, though, because he was still staring at my father.
“Lara…”
“Lara has nothing to do with this!” Davian ground out through clenched teeth.
“With what?” Anthony pulled Davian around to face him, staring at him in shock. “With what, Davian?”
Davian looked away, out the window, pressed his lips together, and my father watched the two of them as if he enjoyed seeing how successfully he could play us off against each other with the power he held.
Davian had never meant anything to him. And neither had Tony.
I wanted to hold my brother back, but everything was spinning too fast inside my head for me to even form a single coherent word.
“Tell me my father is losing his mind right now.”
There was something menacing in my brother’s voice.
“Tell me.”