Total pages in book: 134
Estimated words: 129676 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 648(@200wpm)___ 519(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 129676 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 648(@200wpm)___ 519(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
“Okay.”
“In New York, he met someone. A lovely woman named Fiona. They had an affair. It is my understanding they tried to do the long-distance thing for a while. A year or two. Then she moved to Switzerland, because this was where his career took off. But eventually—after about seven years—they got a divorce. Fiona returned to America, and he stayed in Switzerland. They were childless.”
“So far, so fucking boring.” I yawned into the back of my hand. “What does it have to do with me?”
“A few years after Fiona and Andrin got divorced, she met someone else—a man named Robert—and they entered a relationship. The relationship produced one son.” Daniel paused, staring down at the wooden table. “The child’s name was Gabriel.”
My entire fucking universe tumbled down like a house of cards. To hear about my parents—that they were, in fact, in existence at some point—seemed so trivial. Everybody had biological parents. Yet I never fully registered it before today.
I swallowed hard. “Tell me more.”
“Andrin found out about you when you were less than a year old. He was angry, upset. He had hoped Fiona would reconcile with him eventually, I guess. And there was something more. This, I didn’t find out through the investigators, but it was just an inkling. It is my belief that Andrin couldn’t have any children. Otherwise, why would Fiona conceive almost immediately upon meeting Robert? She wanted children.”
I nodded, transfixed. “She did.” It was stupid. I didn’t know her. Wasn’t aware of her existence until a second ago. And still, I knew. “She wanted children.”
She wanted me.
“Andrin arrived in the States and confronted Fiona and Robert. The police report said that Robert and Fiona died in a burglary gone wrong. The killer was never caught.”
I closed my eyes. Took a deep breath.
“When I met Andrin shortly before his death, I made him tell me the entire story. He killed them, Tate,” Daniel slurred, tears making his eyes glitter.
Normally, I would be uncomfortable with this extravagant show of emotions. Yet I felt just as raw as Daniel. Actually, ten times more.
“He told me Fiona and Robert protected you with their bodies. It was you Andrin wanted to hurt. They fought for you. Begged for your life. Threw themselves at Andrin so you wouldn’t get hurt. He killed them first with the intention of killing you, but by the time he got to you, the police were coming. He heard the sirens. He took you and ran away.”
Everything clicked together. How I showed up at a Swiss boarding school of all places. How I knew so little about my parents. How no one claimed me—my family thought I was dead, along with my parents. How someone seemed to foot the bill for that expensive school—that was Andrin himself.
He hid me so he could fuck with me.
I was his dirty little secret.
Instead of killing me fast, like he did my parents, he killed me slowly, until there was nothing left of my soul and hope.
Daniel spent the night telling me everything. About the so-called skiing accident Andrin had. The confessions he managed to rip from his mouth. The shreds of information he had about my parents. We didn’t sleep. We didn’t drink any more. We just talked and talked until our mouths were parched and our eyes stung.
And even though I recognized that my life was tragic and horrifying to most people, I couldn’t help but think I was the luckiest boy alive.
Because I lost my biological parents.
But I gained a father.
“I booked your annual vacation with Alix and Sadie,” Tate announced from his spot next to me in the back seat of the Escalade, his arm slung over my shoulder, his other hand scrolling through stocks on his phone. “Figured you could use some girl time.”
“Where am I going?” I nuzzled into his neck. He’d been my rock since Mum passed away. It was thanks to his unrelenting devotion that I was able to slide back into reality rather than crumble into it. We drove to work together every day, took lunch together, and went back home together. He’d been good at distracting me, getting us Broadway tickets, taking me to restaurants I’d always wanted to try, and binge-watching highly acclaimed foreign movies with me, even though I knew their slow pace and nuanced topics drove him mad.
“Havana.” His eyes warmed, but his face remained cavalier. “In honor of your mother. I figured you could take off from our house in Crimson Key. It’s close to Miami.”
Our house. I’d never even visited it, but Tate considered what was his also to be mine.
“Thank you.” I pressed my lips to the curve of his jaw. “It’s the best gift. You’re the best gift,” I corrected.
An overwhelming urge to treat him slammed into me.
“Darling,” I said, “I want to make dinner for you tonight.”