You have to fight.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Finnic
“I’ll pay you back I swear, just don’t-”
The video keeps playing, but my brain lags behind it, like it can’t catch up to what my ears have already accepted. Her father’s voice breaks again, the polished tone from before gone.
I watch her instead now.
Her shoulders are still, with a hint of tension in them. Her knuckles whiten as she tightens her fists together and she doesn’t blink as she watches the video play out.
Dante speaks as she keeps her eyes locked on the screen. “They pulled a police report,” he says.
He then glances over at her, reaching out to tuck a displaced piece of hair behind her ear. “It’s from a few years ago, and damn was it buried deep.” He continues, “She went inalone to file the report, but was seen leaving with Mr. Armani here attached at her hip. A little fishy, don’t you think?”
My chest tightens.
I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t.
All I could do was continue to stare at her in absolute shock.
She’s been put through the wringer her entire life with that man and we brought her here and traumatized her some more.
So much for Dante thinking she was some type of mysterious villain.
She sighs before replying, “I thought if I told someone official, it would stop.”
I feel something twist low in my gut.
Dante shifts behind me. “The report never went anywhere. His people intercepted it and classified it as a family dispute. No follow-up. And definitely no protection.”
She looks away from the video.
“They told me that I was confused, hysterical even.”
I clench my jaw.
The video ends with her father sobbing, promising the money back again and again. Dante then shuts off the screen with a click of a button.
I blink, recalling plenty of times earlier when she baited us and manipulated situations. She acted strong heremajority of the time, but only because she was used to having to do that.
I feel nauseated at the thought of someone doing that to their own child. Someone they are supposed to protect. Not whatever fucked up idea he has in his head about what love is supposed to be.
Dante breaks the silence again. “When Viktor told him we had the report, that it could be unsealed, that we would make it go public…” He shrugs once. “That’s when he gave us everything.”
She laughs then.
“Funny how fast he listens when it’s his perfect life on the line.”
He then stands and steps away from her, turning to face me instead. “I don’t think she understands what I’m saying.”
I do.
He’s saying that she’s free to go.
But free to what end?
