I pulled away and sat back.
Crush wiped his face and tugged on his goatee as he studied me real hard. “You look different.”
“I am different.”
He jerked his chin up. “Does he have something to do with it?”
“He’s part of my life now. But he’s not the reason I left.”
Crush stared daggers at Christian. “Go stand outside. This is family business.”
It hardly mattered with Christian’s Vampire hearing, but I gave him a look to go anyhow.
When the door closed, I rested my elbow on the table. “I don’t know where to start.”
He scooted forward. “From the beginning. I’m not going anywhere.”
“You know how aimless I was years ago. It was a confusing time for me, and I was busy trying to find myself. Someone offered me a better life, but I couldn’t come back to this one. That was part of the deal.”
“What deal? You’re not making sense. Did you sell yourself into prostitution? I’ve seen some hard shit in my day, Cookie. Nothing will shock me.”
I rubbed my face. Was I really going to do this? What the hell did it matter? Christian was going to erase his memory, but now I realized that my daddy was going to think I’d been locked up in a loony bin. “The world isn’t what you think it is. I can’t explain the hows and whys; all I can tell you is that someone offered me a chance to be an immortal. I stupidly listened to them and wound up in a morgue. Someone else took me in—a bad man. But even when I escaped, I couldn’t come back to this life. That’s the deal. I’m… I’m not human anymore, Daddy. I’m a monster.”
He sighed. “Maybe I know a little something about demons. There’s a hardness in your eyes that wasn’t there before; I’ve seen that look. I never thought I’d see it in my own little girl.” He wiped his eyes, fighting back the emotions. “I tried to protect you from that. Tried to teach you.”
I reached out and took his rough hand, still stained with oil and grease from the shop. “It’s not your fault. I came here because this is the last time I’ll get to see you. I’m not even supposed to be here, but I had to come back. I needed to tell you…”
“Tell me what?”
My lip quivered as I stared into his blue eyes. The lines on his face told a story of a million bike rides and living life to the fullest. “How much I love you. How you were a good father and I was an ungrateful little shit who never should have left home.”
Crush got out of his chair and pulled me into a tight hug. “There’s nothing you could have done that’ll make me not love you. Do you hear me?” He jerked back and firmly held my head between his hands. “Do you hear me, Raven? Nothing.”
“I’ve killed people.”
His jaw clenched. “Did they have it coming?”
“That’s not the point.”
“It doesn’t matter what you’ve done.” He pressed his finger against my forehead. “I know your heart. I know that piece inside you that you never let anyone else see. You always tried to be the tough girl—Daddy’s girl—but I wanted a better life for you. Not to live in some shithole trailer park and marry a no-good loser who spends too much time at the bar and thinks he can put his hands on you. I thought if you worked in my garage I could pass it down to you someday and you’d have your own business, but maybe my version of a better life and yours were never on the same level. We fought, but that’s because I wasn’t ready to let go of my baby girl. I knew you wanted to meet different people and have a nice job—it was the letting go part I couldn’t deal with. Once you got a taste of the good life, I wouldn’t have a place in it anymore.”
“I wasn’t too good to work in your shop. I was stupid.”
He sat me down and then took the chair in front of me. “You never belonged in a garage. You’re better than that. My princess deserves a mansion.”
Thinking about Keystone, I offered him a fragile smile. “I have a good life now—a nice place to live. I’m not living on the streets and struggling to survive anymore.”
“You could have come home anytime. You’ve always had a place here.”
“I know you feel that way, but I don’t belong here anymore.” Without dragging out the explanation, I let him see my fangs.
Crush sat back and got real quiet.
Embarrassed, I retracted them and warmed my hands on the mug. “How did you bury me without a body?”
He folded his arms, eyes downcast. “They had one, but it was badly burned. I couldn’t give a positive ID. I had your dental records, and they said it matched.”
“They lied. That’s what they do to protect their own.” I closed my eyes, knowing my Creator had staged the elaborate fiction. “He made you believe I died in a fire?”
