My father finally closes the manila folder with a deliberate slowness that makes me want to scream. He sets it on his mahogany desk, places his reading glasses on top with perfect precision, then folds his hands like some villain in a bad movie. The signal that I can finally speak.
“Well?” he says, his voice devoid of emotion. “You said it was urgent.”
I take a deep breath, steadying myself. I waited until my mother left for her weekly tennis match—three hours of guaranteed absence—to corner him alone. No more lies. No more half-truths.
“I need to tell you something important,” I say, leaning forward in my chair. “And I need you to be straight with me for once.”
His eyebrow quirks slightly—the closest thing to an actual expression I’ve seen on his face in years. “Go ahead.”
I take a deep breath. “I know about Vincent Devereux. I know Mom had an affair with him, and I know that whispers say he is my biological father.”
My father’s face remains completely impassive, which is fucking infuriating. I’ve just dropped what should be a nuclear bomb, and he’s sitting there like I told him it might rain tomorrow.
“And?” he prompts when I don’t continue immediately.
“And? Are you fucking kidding me?” I explode, my voice bouncing off the wood-paneled walls. “Your wife had an affair with one of the most powerful men in Black Crown, let you believe her child was yours, and your response is ‘and’?”
He sighs, like I’m being a dramatic teenager instead of a grown woman who’s had her entire identity shattered. “Is there more to this story, Seraphina? Because so far you haven’t told me anything I don’t already know.”
I feel like I’ve been slapped. “You knew? This whole time?”
“Of course I knew,” he says, his tone maddeningly calm. “Your mother isn’t nearly as discreet as she thinks she is.”
I sit back, stunned into temporary silence. My father—the man who once upon a time taught me to ride a bike, who checked my closet for monsters despite my mother’s objections—has known all along that I might not be his.
“Then why...” I trail off, not even sure what I’m asking.
“Why did I raise you as my own?” he finishes for me. His expression softens slightly. “Because you are mine, Seraphina.”
I stare at him, my mouth hanging open like a fucking idiot. “How are you not freaking out about this? Your wife fucked another man and passed off his kid as yours.”
He leans back in his chair, studying me with those calculating eyes I’ve always both admired and feared. “Because you are my daughter, Seraphina.”
“But the DNA?—”
“Even without a test,” he cuts me off, “you’re a spitting image of my grandmother.” He reaches for a silver frame on his desk I’ve never paid much attention to before, turning it so I can see. “Seraphina Maria Carvelli, your namesake.”
The photo shows a young woman from the 1940s, her dark hair styled in vintage waves, but it’s the eyes—my eyes—and the shape of her face that makes my breath catch. It’s like looking at myself in some sepia-toned alternate universe.
“Holy shit,” I whisper, reaching for the frame. He hands it to me, and I trace the glass with my fingertip. Same slight asymmetry to the lips, same everything. “This is fucking wild.”
“Language,” he says automatically, but there’s no heat behind it.
“But Mom said?—“
“Your mother says many things,” he interrupts, taking the frame back and setting it down with careful precision. “Some true, some not. Her affair with Vincent was real. Her claim that you’re his biological child was well a choice.”
“Did you ever confront her? About the affair?” I ask.
He leans back in his chair, fingers steepled under his chin. “We had...discussions. Your mother has always been ambitious, Seraphina. Vincent Devereux represented power she thought she deserved.”
“So you just forgave her?” I can’t keep the incredulity from my voice.
“Forgiveness implies I ever held it against her.” A small, almost sad smile plays at the corners of his mouth. “Marriage is complicated, especially in Black Crown. You’ll understand that someday.”
I think about Lucien, about the complicated, fucked-up dance we’ve been doing. “I’m not sure I want to understand it.”
“Yet here you are, Chosen by Lucien Devereux.” He raises an eyebrow. “The very son of the man you believed to be your father.”
