“Are you kidding me right now?” Evie stared back at the man as if he’d lost his damn mind. “I was kidnapped, Dad! Those men…they took us against our will. They starved us, they hurt me…” Her voice cracked, but she cleared her throat and forced herself to continue, “I just want to know why, okay? Tell me why, and I’ll walk out of this house and never bother you again.”
“As I was trying to say before. I thought the phone call was a scam. A ruse to steal my money. It wouldn’t be the first time someone attempted to rob me of what’s rightfully mine.”
“What’s rightfullyours,” she corrected. “Half of the estate is mine, remember? Also, I might buy the whole scam excuse if I hadn’t spoken to you myself. I talked to you, Dad.Me.I begged you to send the money to save us, and you hung up on me as if I were nothing. As if the five of us were…nothing.” A set of twin tears streaked down her flushed cheeks before she could stop them. “I told youexactlywhat would happen to us if you didn’t pay, and yet, you still want to stand there and tell me you believed it was all a scam designed to steal your precious?—”
The rest of Evie’s words became lost in a startling realization. One that was almost as painful to accept as believing her father was fine letting her die.
“Oh, my god.” She pushed herself off the desk and stood straight once more. “You thought it was me.”
“Evelynn—”
“That’s it, isn’t it? You thought I set up the whole thing. That I orchestrated some big, elaborate kidnapping scheme to steal ten million dollars from you.”
“I…” Her father began but paused before trying to explain himself. “If you’ll recall, I warned you the last time you were here.”
“You told me I was done.” Evie stared back at a man she felt she barely knew. “That was your warning to me, right? You said if I went against your wishes and joined the semester-long program in Afghanistan I was done.” Her heart began to shatter where she stood. “And you what…thought I went over there and decided to getevenwith you? You think I hired members of the Taliban to extort money from you, despite knowing my portion of Mom’s inheritance will be mine in less than a year, anyway?”
According to her mother’s will, half the value of her life insurance policy would go to Evie on her thirty-second birthday. The other half had already been awarded to her father years before, shortly after her mother’s death.
“I think I’ve explained myself quite enough.” Her father rounded his desk and came to where she stood. “As for your threat to air our dirty laundry to my friends and clients…I’d tread very carefully if I were you.”
“Or what?” She arched a defiant brow. “You’ll abandon me to die? Oh, wait. I believe that box has already been checked off your to-do list.”
Evie had never been so utterly spiteful with her father…or anyone else, for that matter. But the longer she stood there listening to him brush away what he’d done as if it were nothing—as ifshewas nothing—the more she questioned how they could even be related.
“You’ve always had such a smart mouth.”
“And you’ve always been a heartless jerk.”
Her father raised a hand as if to strike her, but Evie was ready. On reflex, she grabbed his wrist, stopping him mid-swing.
I’ve had enough of men thinking they can manhandle me into submission.
“Do it,” she challenged. “I’ll have you arrested so fast, your head will still be spinning when they take you into booking.”
Evie shoved his arm away and took a cautionary step back. Her chest heaved, and her heart felt like a sledgehammer pounding against her ribs.
For all his faults, her father had never laid a hand on her in anger. Not even once that she could remember. But now…
His face turned red, and the vein in his forehead seemed to bulge with fury. Rather than cowering beneath the weight of her most recent statement, her father appeared to bolster his emotions into barely controlled anger.
“You think you can come into my office…intomyhome…and disrespect me like this? You think you canthreatenme?”
“I think I’ve more than earned the right to know how you could so easily let me die.”
“The only thing you’ve earned, young lady, is an invitation to leave.”
“I’m not a young lady. I’m an adult,” Evie seethed. “And I’ll leave when I have an answer. Arealanswer. Not some bullshit excuse about a contrived scam that makes absolutely no sense.”
“I’ve said my piece on the matter, and I have nothing more to add.” He turned away with the clear intent of returning to his seat.
Refusing to be so easily dismissed, Evie made a tsk sound with her tongue and gave her head a disappointing shake.
“You know, Dad…you’ve been a lot of things over the years. Serious. Driven. Ruthless. Absent. But a coward?” She stared straight at him. “I have to admit, I never saw that one coming.”
“How dare you?—”
“You know, this is the first time since Mom died that I’m glad she isn’t here. Because if she were…if she could see the kind of father you turned out to be…” A huff of a humorless chuckle escaped. “She’d be so ashamed.”