“Take your revenge for everything I took from you,” he whispers, his other hand snapping out, reaching for my throat.
My claws descend, but I turn them toward the wall at my back and ram them into the stone. With every rasped breath, I fight the need to strike him, but by fuck… I can’t.
Not yet.
Because if he’s really my father…
If he’s really my family…
How can I fight him when I came here to avenge him?
It has to be a lie. A deception of some kind.
It can’t be true.
“You’re lying—” My voice becomes a rasp, my speech cut short when his right hand closes around my throat and blocks my air.
“My blood can’t lie.” His wings push into my shoulders, joining the hand he keeps around my neck to pin me to the wall. “Just asyourblood can’t lie.”
I focus on the black liquid dripping from a gash across his jaw.
His blood is black, not red.
I gave him the wound from which it slides.
He’s healing quickly. The cut is sealing up. The fluid is merely obeying gravity as it continues its downward motion.
“Your mother must have told you that the heir to the Nostra Empire is always born with two traits: golden eyes and black blood,” he continues. “As you can see, I have both.”
It’s undeniable proof that this man is the firstborn and rightful heir to the empire, a powerful underground organization made up of supernaturals who have sworn allegiance to the Nostra family.
Just as my own black blood and golden eyes prove that I’mhisrightful heir.
He has to be my father.
Not dead, after all.
Not murdered.
Everything I believed is crumbling down around me. My foundations have shifted and an abyss is opening at my feet. It’s filled with questions, each of them slithering like a venomous snake.
How could this man hang me from my feet for hours in this dark space and still call himself my father? How could he goad me into fighting him?
We are dark creatures. We aren’t known for our empathy or compassion, but even creatures of the dark understand loyaltyand hierarchy and, in a family like the Nostra family, the need for a strong heir.
I was brought to this place wearing an illusion that disguised my true features, but he would have known I was his daughter from the moment he saw my blood.
Why is he trying to make an enemy of me?
My voice remains a rasp, the barest sound since he’s squeezing my neck so tightly that breathing is painful. “You can’t be my father.”
“Why not, Daughter?” he asks, his lips twisting. “Because I was supposed to be dead?”
Well, that too.And I have a million questions about it, but my reasoning is more painful than that.
“Because my father loved me.”
I didn’t think it was possible for his face to become paler than it already is. His eyes widen and his hand loosens around my neck, although he doesn’t let me go.
