“Logan.” Damien cuts him off. “I’m aware she’s your daughter—”
Wait, what?
“But that doesn’t give her the right to talk to me however she chooses. She’s clearly had a bad education. I don’t think you’re cut out for this shit.”
“First of all, I’m not her father.”
Oh.
“Stepfather. Whatever. You’re the closest thing she has to family.”
“My father was William Day,” I interrupt, my voice shaking. “My mother was Laura Day. You’ve clearly got the wrong person. This whole thing is a mistake.”
But they’ve gone straight back to ignoring me, and my shakiness gives way to anger. A lot more fucking anger than I’ve been feeling yet, now that I’m in this normal, if luxurious, looking living room that makes the threat of death feel a little less present.
I’m suffering through all this bullshit because they’ve got the wrong girl, and they won’t even fucking pay attention to me!
“I only raised her until she was four, so you can’t exactly blame me for her education,” snaps Logan.
Okay, this is a dream. It must be. It’s getting more absurd by the second.
“Well, I guess it’s time to make up for that, eh?” retorts Damien.
The shadow of a smile breaks out on Logan’s face, and he takes a deep breath in apparent relief, but he merely says, “And how the hell can I if you won’t let me keep my fucking key?”
“Fine,” relents Damien at last. “I guess I really have gone soft, as Vale used to say. First letting this girl live, and then leavingyouwith the key. I’d better not regret it.”
I sag back in my chair, feeling like those words are final.
I’m going to live.
For a moment, my overwhelming relief crowds out all else, and I let myself relax against the back of the chair.
“Now get her cleaned up, and I’ll have Vincent get her a new pair of eyeglasses. Or two, because yourstepdaughterdoesn’t look like she takes very good care of her belongings.”
That word makes me tense again. I sit straight back up.
“You’re wrong,” I say loudly. “I don’t have a stepdad. I don’t know who Lia is. My parents were…are… Laura and William Day.”
At last they both seem to register my protest, which Damien reacts to by rolling his eyes. “Your dad was an abusive piece of shit named Carmelo who deserved a far worse death than the one he got. Your mom was a bratty mafia princess named Lia.”
“Not bratty,” cuts in Logan.
“Logan was in love with her,” continues Damien, ignoring him, “and he helped raise you, before it all went to shit.”
I stare at him in utter incomprehension, incapable of even beginning to wrap my head around his words.
I was in part raised… by one of the all-powerful Devil founders?
What the absolute fuck?
Chapter 15
Piper
“No,” I lash out at last.
I know Damien is lying, hemustbe. That or he’s got it all wrong. And yet, tears start to prick at my eyes, wondering if any part of what he’s just said could be true.