But I appreciate the initiative.
I really thought Connor would have beaten any real fire out of her by now and molded her into the perfect political pawn.
A chess piece that moves where it’s told and doesn’t ask questions.
Emma is clearly none of those things.
She’s pacing and plotting and probably planning my murder in graphic detail.
She’s also been refusing to eat, which is pissing me off more than I want to admit.
Three days.
Three fucking days of untouched meals being carried out by guards who report back that Miss Brennan won’t even look at the food.
Three days of watching her get progressively weaker and paler on these monitors.
It’s a hunger strike, obviously.
Her way of exerting control in a situation where she has none.
I understand the psychology of it and even respect it to a degree, but I also can’t let her starve herself to death because that would defeat the entire fucking purpose of taking her in the first place.
Connor needs to believe his daughter is alive and well.
A corpse doesn’t make for good leverage.
So this morning I went up there and made it clear that she either eats voluntarily or I’ll have it done by force.
She chose wisely, even if she did throw a fork at my head afterward.
I almost smiled at that—the sheer audacity of it, the way her green eyes blazed with hatred even as she was clearly weak and dizzy from lack of food.
Almostsmiled.
I caught myself before I did because that would be inappropriate and also probably encourage more fork-throwing.
On the monitor, Emma stops pacing and sinks down onto the couch, pulling her knees up to her chest.
She’s wearing the pajamas I had stocked in her closet, soft cotton pants and a t-shirt, and her dark auburn hair is pulled back in a messy ponytail.
There’s no makeup, no careful styling, none of the polish I saw at the cathedral.
She’s still beautiful.
Maybe more beautiful like this, without all the artifice.
But that’s a thought I immediately shove away because it’s irrelevant and not necessary.
The last three days have been...complicated.
I spent five years fantasizing about making Connor Brennan feel a fraction of the pain he caused my family.
I played through dozens of scenarios in my head—ways to hurt him, ways to destroy him, ways to make him understand what it’s like to lose something irreplaceable.
Taking his daughter seemed like the perfect solution.
Elegant, symbolic, and guaranteed to cause maximum suffering.