Page 27 of Broken Princess
A cold sensation struck at my core. “You wanted her to leave the baby at this mansion, didn’t you?” I asked. “To be raised as a slave and sold when he or she was old enough.”
“Yes. I thought Chloe would realize it was for the best.”
“You honestly thought she’d see it that way?”
“Yes, but unfortunately, she wasn’t as similar to me as I thought. Like I said, it was a serious miscalculation. I suppose I let my maternal feelings override my natural instincts.”
I narrowed my eyes and leaned forward. “She threatened to expose you, didn’t she?”
“Yes. In fact, she was in the middle of typing out some sort of exposé on her phone when I realized what she was up to and grabbed her.”
“What happened then?”
“Well, I was very sad, but I knew I couldn’t let it slide. I had to come up with a plan to deal with her.”
“That plan involved me, didn’t it?”
Liz smiled thinly. “Yes.”
“Why?” I asked, folding my arms. “Why not kill her yourself? It’s not like you didn’t have the resources to do it and get away with it.”
“I know. But I didn’t want to kill my own daughter and get absolutely nothing out of it,” she said, curling her upper lip. “So I decided to use you. I’ve kept a close eye on you over the years, seeing as you were destined to join our family one day, and I knew all of your habits and routines. I also knew your overly-ambitious mother would cover up absolutely anything you did in order to keep you—and her burgeoning career—out of trouble.”
“So you set it all up.”
She smiled proudly. “Yes. I drugged Chloe and took her out to an isolated spot you loved to frequent on that motorbike of yours, and when you came close, I pushed her out onto the road. My associates had created a little oil spill in that exact spot a few hours earlier, so you were bound to hit her.” Liz’s shoulders drooped slightly. “I misjudged the damage the collision would do, though. I thought it would kill Chloe, but it didn’t.”
“Why didn’t you finish her off?”
She shrugged. “No point. She was in a vegetative state after the accident, and that was good enough. She wasn’t going to tell anyone the truth about me or the Order,” she said. “Just in case, I have a doctor inject her with certain drugs every so often. It prevents her from regaining any major brain functions.”
Bile rose in my throat. “You’re sick,” I said. Before she could respond, I held up a hand. “Wait, no. You aren’t sick. You just did it for the greater good. Right?”
“I know you’re being facetious, but yes. I did.”
I rolled my eyes and crossed my arms. “What did you expect to gain from using me to dispose of Chloe?”
“I thought the guilt might help, to be honest.”
“How?”
Her forehead creased. “When we brought you into the family, as per your contract, I knew you wouldn’t be happy. I knew there would be escape attempts. But I thought you might feel so guilty about what you did to Chloe that you would eventually weaken and accept your place with us. After all, you wouldn’t want to hurt the family you’d already hurt so much. Especially when you got away with it the first time.” She wagged a finger at me, as if she were admonishing a naughty toddler.
I narrowed my eyes. “Well, you misjudged that too. My mom covered it up so well that I didn’t even remember what I did to Chloe until this year, when Logan told me.”
Liz’s eyes widened. “Logan knows you hit her?”
“Yes. Why do you think he used to hate me so much?”
“Hm. Well, that explains that,” she said. “I always wondered why he seemed to despise you. It really threw a spanner in the works, because in order for you to manipulate him, I needed you two to get along.”
“Yeah, I figured,” I muttered.
“Why did you two make up, anyway?”
“I told him I didn’t mean to hit her. That it was an accident, and I was sorry. He accepted it.”
“How sweet,” Liz said, voice dripping with sarcasm. She glanced at her watch. “Have I answered all of your questions now?”
