“Let me explain,” I say softly. “Then you can decide what you want to do,”
“Give her a chance Jacob,” Daylan says from behind him. “If you keep shouting over her, she isn’t going to tell you shit,”
Jacob pauses as Asher’s shoulders droop.
“Go ahead then,” Jacob tilts his head.
“Can you drop the gun?”
“The gun stays,” No feeling in his words, face void of everything. He doesn’t even seem affected by this at all, Piper wouldn’t recognise this Jacob before me at all.
Then there is the man I crave like my last breath, if it wasn’t for the wetness in his own eyes, I would think he was the demon he pretends to be. He is acting like this isn’t difficult for him; like he can just switch back to not caring about me with a click of his fingers. I thought my father was the only one who could make me feel worthless and less than as I begged for scraps of his affection. Nothing has ever hit me harder than seeing the man I love look at me like a stranger. Like everything has been a lie.
I swallow down the hurt and try to diffuse the situation. Other than the fact I knew Marlowe, I have nothing else to hide, despite whatever they think.
“My name is Ruella Griffith, my mother is Carmen Griffith and my father,” I stare at him. “Is Archibald Astor,”
“What the fuck?” Daylan moves forward as Asher’s brows meet in the middle. “I thought you said Bishop looked into her past,”
“He did. I went over the file myself,” Asher spits as Jacob pushes the gun against my head, harder this time. “Keep going,” He snarls.
I flinch at the pain and with my discomfort, Asher lifts his gun to Jacob’s head.
“Really?” Jacob’s stare never leaves me as he addresses Asher.
Asher’s mouth opens and shuts as a million things rush through his brain. “This woman could be responsible foreverythingthat has happened to Piper. Toyoursister. And now you are trying to protect her. You are falling for the lies she fed you to fool you,”
Asher shakes his head but stands firm. “Lower the gun and back away,”
Daylan shifts back, his gaze darting between his two best friends as they stand resolute.
“This was your idea Podonok!” Jacob snaps.
“And now I am telling you to drop the gun. And back the fuck away from her,”
Jacob’s jaw shifts from side to side, the muscles rippling. He finally snorts and drops the gun, stomping to the side of the room with the window and placing his back against it. Legs wide and ready to shift if needed again. His eyes a blaze.
Asher clears his throat as my heart starts to calm slightly.
“Continue,” Asher demands, his face falling to the floor once more.
I blink away the tears as best as I can, but they just don’t stop falling as I speak shakily.
“I am the product of an affair. My mother no longer wanted to be a mother so dropped me on my father’s doorstep,” I shrug. “Turns out his wife was already pregnant,” I look off to the side, unable to observe thechange in Asher towards me any longer. “Anyway, long story short, they hated me but raised me, didn’t ever claim me but kept me clothed and fed. The basics while separating me from my sister. Well half-sister,” Daylan puts his knife back in his pocket and settles against my desk. “I stayed home while she came to the academy. Then one day, she suddenly stopped replying to messages. My text’s being ignored was the norm for us because we weren’t that close, so I didn’t think anything of it. But, not replying to my father’s messages,thatwas unheard of. He’s not the type of man you get to simply ignore. As the days went by with no contact my father started to worry,” Jacob and Daylan glance at each other.
“Do you expect us to believe that?” Asher growls. “That you aren’t a part of this too along with your sister,”
I shake my head in confusion. “What?”
“Did you come to finish what your sister couldn’t?” He starts to pace back and forth before me, agitated, angry and with no outlet for it.
“I don’t know what you mean…what…”
“Is dear old daddy in on this as well? Is any of it true Rue? Did he even abuse you or was it all part of your broken girl act to get me to soften around you. Tell you everything about me. Let you get close to my sister. Just so you can take her again like you have taken all those before!” He shouts as I try to take in what he is saying. He truly believes this, that I am part of whatever happened to his sister all because he found out I was connected to Marlowe.
“Calm down man,” Daylan pulls Asher away from me. “I don’t think she knows what you are talking about Ash,”
Asher scoffs before looking at me, no emotion as he speaks. “You’re telling me you didn’t know Marlowe was Piper’s so-calledfriend. A friend who drugged her and had her transferred to aholding facility here on the campus before collecting a huge amount of money as she sold my sister off to a group of men,” My heart stops in my chest. The air in my lungs frozen as I feel the blood drain out of my face. “The same men who planned on selling her as a virgin and forced her to watch another girl getting gang raped. Her only saving grace is that I managed to find her, or she would have more than likely suffered the same fate,”
