His eyes widen slightly, the only show of surprise he shows. He tilts his head and arches an eyebrow. “How should I know? We’ve been searching for her for eleven years.”
I lower my head and narrow my eyes at him.If this man has been lying to me all these years, I’m going to beat the shit out of him.“Let’s look back over the past eleven years,” I say. He gestures to me with his hand as if sayinggo on then. I grind my teeth, but continue.
“Mom wanted you to go to an auction with her in the early summer, but you didn’t want to go because I would be home that weekend.” I watch him and wait.
“Yes,” he says, sounding annoyed.
“And you just let her go?” I ask. I’ve never asked him that outright, but I’ve always wanted to know how that conversation went. I know if McKenzie told me she wanted to go to an auction without me, it wouldn’t happen.
“You know how your mother is.”Isnotwas. “She threw a tantrum when I told her we weren’t going to go that weekend. She was finally beginning to act like herself again, so I told her to go.”
“Why did she have to go? Why couldn’t she miss one?”
“It was her auction. She never missed any.”
The hair on the back of my neck stands on end as I tilt my head at him. “Her auction?”
Dad blinks rapidly as he sucks in a sharp breath. “I…uh…” He exhales and pulls his hands out of his pockets.
“What the fuck, dad?” I ball my hands into fists, forcing myself to stay where I’m at.
He runs his hand down his face. “She didn’t want to tell you until you graduated; then everything happened.” He stumbles over his words, saying them as quickly as possible. “I didn’t want to tell you after that.”
I huff. “If it was her auction, how the hell would she have been sold at it?”
He grimaces and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Son,” he murmurs.
I step forward until I’m only a couple of feet away from him. “Was she sold?” I say through my teeth.
He shakes his head. “No.” I pull my hand back and punch him in the face. He grabs his nose and falls back against the door. I want to punch him again, but I walk away. Shaking my hand at the slight sting, I walk to the window and look over the river. Rex comes bursting in, but I keep my back to him and my dad.
“Sir?” Rex says.
I look at him over my shoulder then glance at my father who’s taken a handkerchief,a fucking handkerchief, out of his pocket and put it against his nose, trying to stop the bleeding.
“Fucking hell. I think you broke my nose.” His voice is muffled as he glares at me.
I shrug. “Be glad you’re still alive.” I look back at Rex. “We’re okay for now, but be prepared to get rid of a body, just in case.” I eye my father again and he snorts, then moans. Rex turns and leaves, closing the door behind him.
“I need to go to the doctor.” I roll my eyes.I’ll get Dr. Chamberland to check him out in a little while.
“Stop being a little bitch. You’re not going anywhere until you tell me everything.” I walk to the chair behind my desk and sit staring at him until he finally sits in the chair on the other side.
“She wasn’t sold or taken. She left.”
My father talked for almost an hour, telling me everything. Things I had no idea about. McKenzie’s father never started the auctions. The auctions started a year after Brighton Academy was founded. It was used as a breeding ground to raise the next world leaders and sell off their pretty little daughters.
I stop at one of my bars on River Street and order a bourbon. Rex walks in a few minutes later. He made sure my father got medical attention for his nose since I couldn’t get in touch with Dr. Chamberland. Any other day I’d be tracking him down, but today he’s the least of my concerns.
Rex leans his back against the bar, keeping his eye on the exit. Another one of his security, Jason, stands at the door. “You punched your father.” He says it like it’s an everyday occurrence.
I down my drink then raise it to the bartender, letting her know I want another. “He’s lucky that’s all I did.” I run my hand along my jaw and shake my head. “He’s lied to me for years.” The knot that’s been forming in my stomach gets tighter. The bartender gives me another drink and I down it too, the warmth of the liquor settling in my stomach.
Rex doesn’t say anything. I rarely drink to the point of getting drunk, but I might do just that tonight and Rex would let me.He’s the only man I trust with my life. I met him a couple of months before I bought McKenzie. I was working my way up through the ranks of my father’s men. One of them got pissed and tried to kill me after one of the fights. Rex killed him instead. I hired him as my security on the spot.
Rex was there looking for Anna or a lead to find out where she was. When he told me about what happened to her, our mission became the same. To take these assholes down. I had no idea my mother was the main asshole. I give Rex a sideways glance, wondering how he’s going to react when I tell him. I lift my glass to the bartender again and exhale.
“I’ve been chasing after the wrong person all these years,” I finally say. Rex glances at me and waits. “Marcus Knight never took my mother or sold her at an auction.”
