Page 321 of Hateful Games

She’d had to have been in the office daily to accomplish that.

I’m pondering what I’m missing when there is frantic movement outside my office before the door is thrown open unceremoniously.

My father’s pale face and rumpled appearance fill my vision.

I’m out of my seat before he even speaks.

“What happened?” I demand, expecting to hear another sneak attack or threat from Mihir. Maybe he released the evidence.

But nothing in the world prepares me for what he utters next.

“Your mom has been in an accident.”

***

Everything is blurred into white noise.

The outside hum. The chatter. The clanking. The hurried footsteps.

Nothing penetrates past the echoing silence ringing in my ears.

I stare at my mom’s lifeless form on the hospital bed, the dried blood from the gnash on her forehead. My fingers brush her hair back, connecting with her skin slowly turning colder by the minute.

She’s gone.

In the blink of an eye.

Just like that.

Even before we rushed to the hospital, every news channel out there announced her demise and spread the CCTV footage of her getting hit by a truck and flipping in the air before slamming and crunching against the windshield.

She died on the spot, is what the doctors said.

The impact caused her to bleed from the ears and nose.

“Ma,” I whisper past the ball lodged in my throat. Sliding my hand down her frail arm, I wrap mine around hers. Squeezing and waiting for the squeeze that won’t come or the warmth telling me she’s only sleeping and will eventually wake up.

She always did.

I startle when a strong hand curves around my left shoulder. “Son.”

“How can she be gone?”

He sighs heavily, unable to answer. What is there left to say?

My last and final conversation with her replays in my head.

“When were you going to tell me, Mom?”

She jerks back, confused, as I enter the kitchen. “About what?”

“That you blackmailed Lily into marrying her daughter with your son.”

Eyes turning wide, her face pales and she swallows. Cautiously she approaches, hands poised to touch me, but I step back. Despair crosses her soft features. “Nova, beta, please. I’m so sorry. It wasn’t my best moment. Once the decision was made, I regretted it immediately and tried to fix it, but Mihir, he—he wouldn’t listen to reason.”

“Yet you let me believe it was Dad who forced me into it.”

“I wanted to confess but you… seemed happy. You were always so angry at your father, the world, but with Rosalie, you smiled and laughed.”

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