“Exactly,” Stefan agreed. “It was my plan all along.”
I sat up, my mind still reeling with all the implications. “What about my father? How is he involved?”
There was still bad blood between us. We hadn’t spoken since the fight we’d had at his office, the day I’d told him he wasn’t my father anymore.
“I shouldn’t tell you,” Stefan said. “This is between me and my father.”
“No it’s not,” I said. “It’s so much bigger than that, and you know it. Tell me.”
But waiting for Stefan’s response, I couldn’t help holding my breath. I needed to know the truth, but whatever he told me about my father would change my opinion of him forever.
Stefan took a deep breath and then sat up, leaning back against the headboard.
“Your father,” he began, “is deeply involved with KZM’s illegal business dealings.”
It wasn’t a surprise, but I still felt my stomach drop. Still felt the shock of betrayal.
He went on, “Not only is he one of the company’s most profitable clients himself, but he also gets kickbacks for referring other wealthy, high-powered men to the backdoor side of the agency. And he refers a lot of them.”
I felt as if the wind had been knocked out of me. I had braced myself to hear something bad, but I hadn’t expected it to be this bad. Hearing that my father used KZ Modeling as a client made me sick—and my heart went out to my stepmother, Michelle. I couldn’t help wondering if she knew. She’d always told me there were trade-offs to being a trophy wife. Was that because she knew firsthand the kind of indignities I might have to face? Had she spent her entire marriage to my father turning a blind eye to his indiscretions? Or had she been in the dark as much as I had been? Maybe it was something in between. Knowing that he wasn’t faithful, but never imagining that he had aligned himself with an illegal sex trafficking ring.
The more I thought about it, the more I began to realize the implications.
“This information would destroy my father’s career,” I said out loud, understanding dawning on me. “Not just politically, either. He’d be in jail. Maybe for the rest of his life.”
Stefan nodded. “You can see why both of our fathers approved of this match,” he said. “Marrying you gave my father a reason to protect your father’s secret. And in turn, being connected to your father publicly gives KZ Modeling legitimacy. If there were any rumors about KZM being an illegal front, they’d be much more easily dismissed thanks to having a highly respected U.S. senator connected to the Zoric family. Our marriage protects both of them.”
“And puts us in the middle of their tangled web,” I said bitterly.
It was a lot to take in. A lot to realize how deeply my father was involved.
We sat there together in silence, Stefan giving me time to absorb all the information and the harsh reality of our situation.
“What about Irina?” I asked, thinking of the beautiful woman who had come to my table at the coffee shop. “Why was she thanking you? Was that related to all of this?”
“I’ve been trying to help the models as much as I can,” he said slowly. “It’s complicated. Sometimes, if I can, I book them as a client—under a fake name—just to give them a night off from their work. I get a hotel room, order up a hot meal from room service, listen to them talk. I try to help them make plans to escape. Sometimes it works.”
I nodded. “That explains all the nights you come home so late. Or not at all.”
Stefan took my hand. “I don’t sleep with them,” he said firmly. “I’m not like my father, and I don’t use women like that.
“Irina was one of the models I was able to help get away. I’ve done that with a few women—I wish it were more, but it’s too risky. There was a woman in Hungary, do you remember Oksana? She’s one of the women I helped.”
“I remember.” And I remembered clearly. At the time, I had found her devotion to Stefan suspicious and worrying. Now I understood it. I understood, too, why Irina had called Stefan a “good man.” All the sneaking around, the cageyness, the secrets and lies—all this time, my husband had been trying to save as many of these exploited women as possible.
“How many women have you helped?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Not enough. But the organization is so big. So massive. My father’s reach—and your father’s influence—are a powerful shield. They’re well-protected, they have allies, and there’s only so much I can do without putting my bigger plans at risk.”
“So what are those plans?” I wanted to know. “What’s the end goal?”
“My dream is to eventually go straight,” he said. “Make KZ Modeling a real talent agency and nothing more. It doesn’t need to be a sex slave ring. In fact, we could have gone straight years ago, from the beginning, if not for my father’s greed and megalomania. He wanted too much. Money, power, women, connections. And control. Always control. He’s willing to do anything to get that.” He looked at me, his eyes blazing.
I was overwhelmed as I thought of everything Stefan had gone through all these years. I couldn’t believe he’d done all this on his own, that he’d been carrying the burden on his shoulders with no one to talk to.
“You should have told me,” I said, my voice thick with tears.
He’d protected his brother and his sister, while doing everything he could to combat his father’s monstrous behavior and practices. Always wearing that mask, keeping up that façade, just so he could continue to work for his father, continue gaining his trust, while at the same time secretly attempting to dismantle the very company he was expected to inherit.
