Page 15 of Burn It Down

The bright white walls stained with blood, a single lightbulb hanging from the ceiling, the concrete floor, the chains screwed into the walls… it was a room within one of their slaughterhouses.

“You’re finally coming around?” Samuel asked. “Your gaze is more focused.”

“Slaughterhouse?” I murmured.

“That’s right.”

“It’s the same one Lan was held captive in actually,” my father told me.

When he spoke this time, I finally noticed the hoarseness of his voice. I focused on him, the blur still compromising my vision, but I was able to make him out. He had a bandage wrapped around his throat, a little blood showing through. His face was bruised and sporting abrasions.

I’d done that.

That was the result of my attack on him in that room.

The chair… after he’d touched Aurora.

I’d been right on the verge… I’d almost succeeded… almost ended him.

And then it had all been ripped away.

Now he stood there in a fresh, tailored navy suit, his thick black hair styled perfectly, the only signs that anything had happened being those marks on his face and the bandage.

Samuel released my jaw and stepped back as my father pushed his way forward and crouched down in front of me.

I shuddered as he stroked my jawline, the malice in his gaze a sharp contrast to the gentle touch.

This wasn’t good.

This wasn’t good at all.

“The very room you helped him escape from.”

A chill rolled down my spine.

He eased the blanket aside a little, then traced his free hand over my scar there, the one I’d had Lance inflict to keep up the ruse that he’d overpowered me.

“Quite a ballsy move to have actually allowed him to stab you.” He dug his fingers into the flesh of the healed wound, making me grunt. “All to deceive me.”

“You can’t… you don’t—”

“I can’t know? Is that what you’re trying to convey in your discombobulated state?” He released my side and ran his other hand over the coarse stubble plaguing my jaw. “You pulled off a master deception, I’ll give you that. Unfortunately, from your standpoint at least, you made the mistake of believing Lan to be the honorable war hero that his well-crafted image projected.”

“What are you… I don’t…”

“He betrayed you, son.”

“No.”

“You met with him recently, yes? In person? Right up close?”

I gritted my teeth.

“There’s no point denying it. I have proof. He used that meeting to infiltrate your phone and your entire network by extension. He pulled those recordings I’m now aware you made of his time here and sent them to me. There was more than just my torture of him on it, there was you and him making a deal, the stabbing that occurred. You kept that part to hold him to the deal he struck with you, the deal that had you saving his life. A big mistake, as you’re now starting to understand. He also accessed some surveillance footage from the dollhouse sites of you—just you—infiltrating the houses. There was even a lovely little scene of you murdering one of my top trainers. Samuel’s favorite, actually.”

The memory came back to me, the nicotine kicking in enough to give me a little more focus. A little.

“This… what you’re doing here… it’s fucking treason. To your own father. You won’t survive it.”

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