I clamped my hands over my ears. Too loud.Always too loud.He was always like this.
I moved for the door, but his grip seized my arm, stopping me. “Do you think I’d let you roam the UK for ten years if I’d known you weren’t cured? Do you think I’d let you take over this project?” His jaw tightened. “Shit, you even showed your face at the press conference, Zioh!”
He drew a harsh breath. “How could I pull you back after I begged and pleaded for you? After all I’ve done, how can I face them only to find out you’re still defective?! You’re still crazy! If I’d known you werestill—”
“I never asked that!” I clenched my jaw, forcing myself free.
My whole body trembled, not out of fear, but with blood boiling inside me. I was sick of his words and behaviour—all I could see was hate before me. “You think I’m happy?” My fists clenched. “I’m tortured!”I screamed, my lungs burning. “I want you all to fucking leave me alone!!”
How could he face them? He wouldn’t let me take over? He begged forme?
I wanted to laugh.
Not forme,but forhim. Everything he did was for himself.Always had been. All I wanted was distance from him, from his bloody company.
If he was so afraid of ruin, he should’ve been ashamed of what he kept doing and roared for himself!
Every time he was near, I felt sick to my guts!
“You never helped me, Dad,” I said with a shaking I struggled to contain. “Even in the UK, you never did anything.”
“Dad? W-what are you d-doing?” I stammered, frozen where I stood. “H-how could you do th-this to Mum?!” My voice broke as I yelled at my father. “You f-fucking arsehole—” The taste of metal flooded my mouth. Heat flared in my cheeks as my dad’s slap sent me to the floor.
I shook my head. My knees went weak. The pieces of memory that made my stomach knot up always returned so easily when I was with him. One, two, three, four—“I’m terrified I will never see my Sophie again—”
Enough.
I looked at my dad with a gaze that carried more than words ever could. “So don’t pretend you gaveyourlife for me, when all you ever did was takemineaway.” My voice cracked, silencing him, though his stare remained sharp.
“Mas… I can’t even say her name anymore…”A hot sting pooled in my eyes.
I stepped closer and lowered my gaze. “You’d better shut your mouth and go on living with your bloody slag—”
My cheek burned hot, stinging. My ears rang from the slap he landed on me. The sound cracked through the room, and for a second, the world spun.
Damn it.
A laugh broke from my throat, bitter and unbidden.
I wished this pain were the kind he gave me, but no, he gave me wounds that would never heal instead, and left me…defective.AndI’d been carrying this poison feeling for so long—the wish that he was never my father.
I laughed louder until I choked, staring blurrily at him, with my burning, trembling eyes. I stopped when I caught his look—the damn look I despised. Disgust. Shame. Shock. Pity.
My eyes cut into him. “Why are you so upset about the mess you started?” I said with pain in every word, but I was the only one who could feel it, not the man in front of me, because I’d never seen anyone as emotionally dead as him.
A smile touched my lips, trembling. “You’re angry at a situation you created.”“Zioh… It’s all in your head. I didn’t do it, remember?”Pieces of memory started flashing behind my eyes.“You’re exaggerating, son.”I pointed at myself, my eyes locked with his. “You createdthis.”
You createdme.
Your own living shame.
His eyes widened. I took a heavy breath and looked straight ahead. “You won’t leave? Fine. Then I will.” My voice dropped, and I left him there as he continued to look at me as if I were filth in his food.
When I left my room, a few of his men waited like dogs at my door. Dad followed me and gave me a sharp look before whispering to one of them.
My pulse leapt into my throat.
Because I knew.
