Total pages in book: 227
Estimated words: 220940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1105(@200wpm)___ 884(@250wpm)___ 736(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 220940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1105(@200wpm)___ 884(@250wpm)___ 736(@300wpm)
“Are you ready to fill in those blanks?” I ask, and she nods, her happy smile faltering. I take her hand and hold it. “How did you come to be in Bernard King’s possession, Pearl?”
She swallows, her eyes darting. “Because—” Her voice is noticeably tight. “Because he killed my dad.”
I recoil. Her dad didn’t die in a drink-driving incident? “Because he wanted you?” I ask.
“No. He killed him because he hated him.”
“Who was your dad, Pearl?”
Her stare remains on her lap, and I allow it. Anything she needs to make this easier. “He was Bernard King’s brother.”
I jerk, jarring her arm. It’s not her broken one, but she still flinches. “Fuck, I’m sorry. He’s your uncle?” I question, stunned.
She peeks up, and I see eyes so fucking terrified. What the hell did he do to her? “Bernard hated my dad because he was everything he wasn’t. Successful, respected, self-made. A tyrant at times too, but he could control his temper. Bernard couldn’t. He was a bully. Jealous of what my dad had made for us. My mother and I were my father’s trophies. Another facet to his achievements, and Bernard wanted to take away everything Dad had achieved.” She shrugs, biting at her lip.
“My God.” I rub at my forehead. “He’s your fucking uncle?”
“He was always there on the periphery of our lives.” Her hand flexes in mine, not to release it, but to cling on that bit tighter. “Trying to upend everything. Scare my mum, force my dad into losing his temper. There was a time when he wasn’t around.” She smiles. “He joined the forces. I heard Father tell Mother that it satisfied his need to hurt people. But then he came back when I was ten and my mum was back to being anxious again. Father back to being angry.” She blinks, and I move closer, catching the tear that rolls down her cheek, truly petrified to hear the rest of this story. But I need to know everything.
“Go on,” I whisper.
“He showed up at the house,” she continues after a deep breath. “And Mother hid me in the closet. I was there for . . . I don’t know. Hours. I came out, scared, because my father would be annoyed if I hadn’t done what I was told. I saw my uncle putting my father in his car. His body was floppy.”
“Bernard’s car?”
“My father’s car.”
“Drunk driving,” I breathe.
“Yeah.” Her eyes drop to the sheets. “He moved into our home after that. Said he needed to look after his brother’s family.” She laughs at her lap. “He didn’t look after us. He terrorized us. Treated my mother like a slave, hit her if she did things wrong, forced her . . .” She swallows.
“My love,” I whisper through gritted teeth, struggling to hold it together.
“She tried to run once. He broke her legs so she couldn’t run again.”
Fucking hell.
“He never touched me, though,” she goes on. “I think Mum hung on to that. Which is why she decided to leave this world too.” Her glassy eyes find mine. “She left me with him.”
“And his punching bag was gone.”
“So I became his . . .”
I cough over my shock, my sweat intensifying. “Oh Pearl.”
“He never…well, you know.”
Virgin. I reach for her mouth and put my finger across her lips, staring at her. And that's the part of her story she shared with me before today that’s true. Her mother chose death over her daughter. Uncle Carlo was an immoral man, granted, but he had my back. Guided me. Looked out for me. Loved me in his own fucked-up way. Pearl had a man who resented her. Despised her. Fuck me. What has she endured since she lost her parents? “You were thirteen,” I say. “When your mum died.”
“Thirteen and three months.”
“You didn’t try to get away?”
“Once. He made sure I couldn’t run again, but he didn’t break my legs like he did my mum’s.” She indicates the scar on her nape, and I move back in my chair.
“No,” I breathe. “He put a tracker in you?”
“I tried to dig it out.”
I withdraw. “Wait—”
“The Polish men removed it. My uncle didn’t tell them about it. But I did.”
Jesus Christ, so even for a payday of one hundred million, he still couldn’t let her go? I can’t form any words. I also need a break from the horror movie playing in my mind. So I hold my hand up, and I feel like a complete asshole calling for a timeout. I get up and start walking around the room, trying to walk off the rising fury. I can’t wrap my twisted mind around such cruelty. Couldn’t if Pearl was a perfect stranger. But she’s not a perfect stranger. She’s mine, and knowing what her life was before I found her fucking kills me.