“We each have a role to play, Mara.”
“So, my role is to, what? Be the mentally ill wife? The one so strung out on medicine that my husband feeds me so I’m kept docile? Allow Chase to use our name like a fucking stepladder in the Syndicate? Hope I end up overdosing by the time I’m forty just to end my fucking misery?”
Kade’s mouth drops open and Valen tilts his head. Milo sinks into his chair, jaw working.
“You think I’d thank you for keeping me locked up? For playing bride in this twisted game? Our father sold me to the highest bidder because they wanted him to. The issue is that the Syndicate can’t handle people like me, people like Evie. People like Xana. They make women like me disappear. Women who can see past a man’s bullshit.”
Milo springs up, slamming his palms on the desk. It’s too late to stop it; I’ve already started this avalanche. “Stop it!” he yells.
I stand too. “Stop what? Telling the truth?”
He takes a breath. “Mara, no. We did what we had to. Dad did it for you, for us.”
“For us?!” I laugh. “Us? Don’t insult me. This is not protection. If our father’s empire falls because I opened my mouth, it’ll be on his hands, not mine. I’m done being his pawn.”
Valen clears his throat behind me. “You don’t know what you’re doing; this is bigger than you.”
I look back to face him. “Then teach me, because right now, I’m free.”
Milo hurls the jar down. The finger slams against the lid and sloshes back down to the bottom. “Protect you?” he hisses. “Do you honestly think I would let anything happen to you?”
I fold my arms, jaw tight. “You let everything happen to me. You stood there while our father gift-wrapped me for the man who murdered his last girlfriend.”
Milo flinches. “You don’t know that.”
“I do, and so do you. What if the Syndicate gives an order to kill me, just like they did for Evie. Do you think Chase wouldn’t think twice? Don’t be so fucking dim. Chase couldn’t give two shits about me. He’d slit my throat and go play fucking golf later.”
Kade stands, anger flickering in his eyes. “Mara... please?—”
“Stay out of this, Kade.” Milo cuts him off and pivots back to me. “What do you think, that you’d be allowed to date anyone from Omega Chi? Do you get how insane that is? Our blood doesn’t mix, Mara. Those men cut off your fiancé’s finger, and you’re defending the lunatics?”
I bare my teeth. “At least they never lied to me. You’ve hurt me my entire life. You try to call it love, say it’s for the family. You all dressed me up like a fucking doll and expected me to thank you for the leash. Well, news flash, brother, this bitch is done.”
“Not yet—Mara, do you hear me right now? Get your head on straight. They’re monsters.”
“And you’re a coward. You watched me get handed over like currency and stayed quiet. You let our father treat me like leverage. You smiled while I was dying inside my entire fucking life,” I snap.
“You’re being delusional.”
“Am I?” I retort, standing up and walking toward Milo until the desk hits my thighs. “I’d rather be delusional and alive than murdered for not matching an agenda.” I tilt my chin up at him.
Valen moves behind me and steps closer to me. “You think you’re the first girl to slut themselves out for Omega Chi? They’re not your salvation, they’re men. And men like them will crown you queen one minute, and sell your corpse the moment they find dollar signs more lucrative than your pussy. Let us help you find another way to say ‘fuck you’ to your dad.”
My spine straightens, but I don’t turn to face him. I don’t give him the dignity of seeing my reaction. But something in the way he says it, soft and almost pitying, curls hot and ugly in my chest. “Help me? Or hold me against my will in the name of protection? I know OCK, Valen. IchooseOCK.Theyactually give me choices.”
“You think Jasper loves you? You think Dredyn wouldn’t slit your throat if his dad ordered it?” Valen presses.
“I—” My throat locks.
Kade steps in closer to my left, hands up like I’m some spooked animal. “Mara, you don’t have to do this. Just slow down; talk to us. You’re still family.”
I laugh. “Family? You mean the people who feed me pills to keep me numb and let Chase mark me like property?” I twist to face Kade. He doesn’t flinch, but there’s regret on his face and cowardice in his eyes.
“You don’t know what they’re planning,” Valen says, closing the last few inches between us. I can feel his breath at my nape. “You’re leverage to them too, Mara, just a prettier pawn. Different packaging, same game.”
I hate that part of me wants to believe him. That traitorous voice deep in my gut whispers,What if he’s right?What if the boys I trust are just carving me into a new form of useful?
But then Milo speaks. “Mara, just stay. You’re not thinking clearly.”
