Turning away from him, I take a moment to gather myself, taking a few slow, deep breaths.
“By the way,” I turn back to face him, “mygrandfather is one of the men who did business with Elias. Think on that for a bit.”
thirty-six
The night is a complete wash.
I manage to successfully avoid both Liam and Matthias for the rest of the gala. I doubt either one of them notices my absence, and if they do, they choose not to pursue me. No one here could have funded such a large coup, or if they could, they don’t have the proper resources or contacts to pull it off.
A man on stage is animatedly gesturing around him, thanking any number of patrons who donated to the silent auction charity the gala is being held for. A whole bunch of hot air, if you ask me. I am still running the numbers through my head, the ones on the nearly hidden page in Libby’s journal.
They have been bothering me all night.
It is like my brain has been processing everything, but my mind isn’t seeing it clearly.
“You need to fix this, Matthias,” Leon’s voice hisses. I have been standing behind a large pillar near one of the hallways that leads toward the kitchens. It is quiet and out of the way and aplace the snobby high-class posh assholes won’t approach me. Too near the working-class citizens.
“There’s nothing to fix,” Matthias growls. “It’s over after tonight. Once the gala is done, we’re through. I only needed her for the information. Nothing else.”
“Her family is powerful.” Leon’s tone is bitter. “You shouldn’t have gotten her involved with all of this. You should have just left well enough alone, but we all know how you like to punch the fucking bear,brat.”
“Careful with your tone,brat,” Matthias sneers.
Jesus, they are talking about me.
“All I’m saying is that if you don’t fix this, she’s going to go running back to them.”
“Good,” Matthias chuckles darkly. “Let her.”
My heart shatters in my chest, my mind spinning. It really is over; he admits to it. Admits he has just been using me. Needing a spot of fresh air to sort through the emotional kettlebell that has just been lugged at me, I head toward the employee door at the back.
It hurts more than I think it will, his confession to Leon, but there is no denying that I have fallen for him. I definitely don’t regret signing those papers. Now all I have to do is find a way to move forward without him. Without anyone, if that’s what it takes.
I am not sure where Liam and I stand.
Not after my big blowup. It’s necessary though. Probably could have been slightly more tactful about it, but there is no hopping in that time machine. He needs to understand how I feel and that I won’t tolerate being treated like a commodity. That my voice is just as important as Seamus’s or Kiernan’s. That what I say has merit.
Sometimes you live in a haze for so long that you forget it’s there. He needs someone to push him and show him the demons lurking among the shadows.
“What are you doing out here?”
Speak of the devil.
“Getting some air,” I tell him like it is the most obvious thing in the world. “Why else would I be out here?”
“I was worried when I couldn’t find you,” Liam scolds angrily. “I thought maybe something happened to you.”
“Why do you care?” I snap, folding my arms against my chest as I stare him down. My heels, and the five or six glasses of champagne I’ve had, make me bold.
“You’re my daughter,” he tells me, confusion etched in the lines on his face. “Why wouldn’t I care?”
“You didn’t seem to care about what I had to say,” I bite out. Liam stares at me, his brow furrowed, sadness lining his aging eyes. He feels bad. Seeing the remorse so openly displayed, I soften my voice. “I get it. You barely know me. I barely know you, but I need you to trust me or at least listen to what I have to say without automatically dismissing my observations and opinions. I’m done being everyone’s pawn. An instrument to be played with and then put away again when it’s no longer useful. That’s all I’ve ever been. No one has ever listened. No one has ever cared what I had to say.
“Elias is the man I thought to be my father for the last twelve years, and even though finding out that isn’t the case lifts the heavy weight from inside me, it doesn’t mean that the damage he caused isn’t still there. Do you understand?”
Liam swallows hard, a stray tear escaping as he clenches his eyes tightly closed and takes a shaky breath.
“I’m sorry, Avaleigh,” he apologizes, his voice filled with sorrow and pain. “You were right. I wasn’t listening, and for that I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have gotten upset; I should havelistened. You have this uncanny ability to see connections where no one else does, and as much as I don’t want to believe Seamus McDonough has anything to do with this, I think you might be right. Please, forgive me. I promise, as your father, to do better in the future.”
