“Of being his daughter.”
That stops me.
Because I know that shame.
God help me, I know it.
I’m Mike Welles’s son in every room I enter. Even when I hate him. Even when I outgrow him. Even when I build a kingdom from the rubble he left. Blood follows. Name follows. Men look at me and decide which pieces of him still live in me.
Sophie is standing in front of me wearing the same curse in a prettier dress.
I soften for one heartbeat.
Then I remember she hid it.
Ages. Months.
The softness hardens again.
“I can understand the shame,” I say. “I can’t understand the silence.”
She nods like I have hit her and she accepts the blow. “I know.”
That makes me angrier.
I want her to fight. I want her to defend herself so I can be furious without feeling cruel. But Sophie stands there and agrees with me, and the part of me that loves her wants to close the distance, pull her against me, and tell her we will burn the truth out together.
The president in me knows better.
The man who has been lied to by family knows better.
The fiancé doesn’t know what he knows anymore.
I turn away.
“Soph, I can’t marry you with this between us.”
The words leave my mouth and change the room.
Her face goes white.
I feel my own blood go cold.
I did not say I won’t marry her.
I said I can’t marry her with this between us.
There is a difference.
Right now, it doesn’t sound like one.
“Legend,” she whispers.
I look back at her because I owe her that much. “I’m not calling it off.”
Her breath catches.
“But we postpone.”