He shrugged. “You were probably left on the doorstep or found in a drug den the way most of the kids were. Is that all?” He returned his attention to his computer screen.
Asshole. “Fine. Let’s cut the bullshit. DNA says I’m your kid. I’m guessing you weren’t all that careless with your…” she paused, trying not to think about old man sperm. “Your baby-making materials. You had to be involved with me ending up here.”
Oh god. She was going to throw up.
“You’re smarter than you look. How did you end up a courier?”
He sounded proud. She didn’t want that.
Did she?
“Took the Tremaine skills test, and it said courier. Who’s my mother?” She asked another question quickly so he wouldn’t dismiss her.
“Some girl from the Solveig family. Where’s your ambition?”
Dizzie dug her fingers into the arms of her chair and struggled not to react. If he meant the Solveig Consortium, she had not one but two parents from the corporate class. Her whole life they’d drummed into her how much she owed the corporation that owned her and now…
Now,theyowed her. Owed her for her lost childhood and the parents she never knew.
Anger surged and she tamped it down. She couldn’t afford any distractions, not even her mother’s identity. Not while she and her father were involved in this bizarre answer-for-answer dance.
“My ambition is directed solely at paying off my contract. Wanna take care of that for me?” As soon as the words escaped, Dizzie knew they were the wrong ones.
“Is that why you’re here? You think you can blackmail me into canceling your contract?” His voice barely changed but she heard the sudden disinterest.
Dizzie was tired. Tired of the corporate games. Tired of pretending to be someone else. “I have no fucking clue why I’m here.” She leaned back in the chair. “I’d love to have my contract paid off. Working it off is a shitty way to live and I want my freedom. But I also want to know who the hell sent the bomb that killed your son-in-law.” Her brother-in-law. Grief for the family she’d never known welled up.
She’d gone from having no family to having a crazy dysfunctional one.
“Right now, though, I want to know how and why I ended up in the crèche.”
“Why would I give you those answers?” Phillip Tremaine—she would never consider him her father—leaned back in his seat. This was a man used to getting his way. Closing deals. Making money. Winning at all costs.
And she was facing him with no cards.
Sure, she could threaten to go to the newsies, with the DNA results to prove her story. That wouldn’t protect her from the might of a multinational corporation. And she could “mysteriously” die before she could tell her story.
Throwing herself on his mercy wouldn’t work either. Everything she knew about him indicated that he didn’t have any. She needed to give him a reason to keep her alive. She went with honesty. Maybe she’d surprise an answer out of him.
“I don’t know,” Dizzie admitted. “But I’ve got nothing to lose by asking.”
She barely breathed. She was so far out of her league here, it wasn’t funny.
He stared at her. Then, to her surprise, he started talking. “Your mother was from Solveig Consortium. One of the younger daughters. I met her on a business trip to Sweden. She was careless, got pregnant.”
This time his laugh was pure villain.
Shivers raced up her spine. Dizzie held herself rigidly still, afraid any movement would distract him.
“Somehow she got it into her head that I would leave my wife for her.” He looked directly at her, daring her to challenge him. His eyes were blue like hers, but infinitely colder.
Dizzie gulped. Her need for answers had blinded her and she’d underestimated him. Would she leave this room alive? “What happened to her?’
A cold smile curved his lips. “She believed a baby would bring the companies closer together. It was…unfortunate…when she died in childbirth.”
The lack of feeling in that statement chilled her.
“I already had a wife and an heir. Solveig had nothing to offer. I’d already made significant inroads into their geographic market. I didn’t need closer ties with the company. I needed new revenue sources.”
