Page 49 of Be My Traitor

“Daisy, we need to tell you something.” Her mother took hold of one of her hands. “We always meant to tell you, but somehow the time was never right. But we feel that you deserve to know the truth.”

“That I’m adopted?” Daisy said.

“You know?”

“I’ve known for years.” Daisy rolled her eyes. “I was looking for some paper to do a picture and I found some documents in your office. It made a lot of things made sense, but I wasn’t upset about it. I figured that you chose to be my parents, which makes our relationship even more special and I thought I’d find out about my birth family when I was older.”

“About that…” Mr May shuffled about uneasily. “We were told that you didn’t have any family. That was why we chose you. You had no one to take care of you, no brothers or sisters, no parents or grandparents. The agency told us that your family died in a car crash. But we’ve just found out that that was a lie.”

“That’s weird.” Daisy frowned. “So what did happen to them?”

Mr May looked at me, indicating that I should take over telling the story.

“I don’t know about your father, but your birth mother is very much alive,” I told her. “No one knows where she is right now, but I’ve got people look for her.”

“Why wouldyoudo that?”

I took a deep breath. “Because I’m your brother.”

Daisy’s expression would have been comical if the situation wasn’t so serious. Her jaw dropped and her eyes widened while her skin paled.

“Mybrother?But you’re the head! You can’t be my brother. You’reancient!”

“I’m not that old.” I laughed. “But our mum was really young when she had me. I don’t think she’d planned on having any more children, but when you came along, she must have figured out that she could make some more money.”

“Moremoney?” Daisy asked.

“She effectively sold me to Penelope Donatello,” I told her. “And then she kidnapped my daughter and forced me to sign over all my money to her. I’ll be honest, Mr and Mrs May. I don’t think there’s enough money in the world to satisfy my mother. It’ll take her a while to burn through the Donatello fortune, but when she has, I wouldn’t be surprised if she came after Daisy. I think the agency targeted you because they knew you were wealthy and associated with House Knight. Having taken all the Donatello money, my mother is going to want to go after the Knights.”

“Well, she’ll have a fight on her hand if she does,” Mr May snarled, clenching his fists. “I won’t let that woman get anywhere near my little girl. I don’t care if she gave birth to her. Daisy’s my daughter and I’ll kill anyone who tries to hurt her.”

“My mother’s sneaky,” I warned him. “She’ll come after you when you’re least expecting it. But we’ve got people looking for her and they’re the best at what they do. It won’t be long before we find her.”

“We’ll help,” Mr May offered. “Anything we can do, let us know.”

“But she’s my mother. She wouldn’t hurt me,” Daisy said.

“You don’t know her,” I said. “She’s not normal. She’s had serious drink and drug problems in the past. She’s had a tough life and it’s twisted her. You didn’t see what she did to Amber, what she was prepared to do. Anyone who is willing to hurt their young granddaughter won’t think twice about harming any of their other relatives.”

“Oh.” Daisy gulped and looked down.

“But I didn’t come here to talk about her,” I said. “I want to talk about you, about us. You have no idea how happy I was to find out I had a sister. I’ve always wanted a family and I’d really like it if you wanted to spend some time together, get to know each other.”

“That would be weird,” Daisy said. “I mean, you’re the head and you’re dating my English teacher. How can I see you as my brother?”

“Don’t tell anyone, but I don’t think I’m going to be head for much longer,” I told her. “I took the job because I wanted to find you. Now that I have, I don’t know whether I want to stay at the Academy. Then again, with my mother running off with the content of my bank balance, maybe I’ll stay on because I need the money!” I laughed, my weak joke bringing a smile to Daisy’s face. “But seriously, Daisy, maybe we’ll have nothing in common and we’ll drift apart. But I’d really like to try to get to know each other, build some family ties, that is, if it’s okay with your parents?”

“As far as I’m concerned, the more people who can watch Daisy’s back, the better,” Mr May said.

“I agree,” Mrs May nodded. “After Amber’s kidnapping, you can’t be too careful. It would be good for Daisy to get to know her brother.”

“Why don’t you come out with us next week?” Milly offered. “We’re taking Amber to the beach. It’ll be a laidback day, fish and chips, candy floss, sunbathing…”

“I’d like that,” Daisy said at last. “You’re right. It would be good to get to know each other.”

We smiled at each other and I felt like everything was going to be all right. Finally, I was going to have the family I’d always dreamed of.

Chapter 20

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