Page 105 of Call You Mine

Her career as a model, the potential of fame and popularity, came crumbling down when she was practically forced into an arranged marriage with a man ten years her senior. As I grew older, her indifference became jealousy. The more people told her how incredibly lucky I’d been to have inherited her genetics only they’d been perfected in me, the more she begrudged me. It was why she got work done and Botox injections at only twenty-five years old. Not only the fear of aging and not looking like the glorious beauty queen she was revered for, but having someonethreaten to take her crown was something she could never move past.

When I discovered the truth about my family’s history, how Willa was forced to marry Warren Servite—the man I believed to be my father—only to provide the Servite Dynasty with an heir, I felt sorry for her. Soon after her marriage, Warren couldn’t conceive any children. Instead of taking an alternate route if children were really something they wanted, my mother was forced to conceive a child with Wesley, who, although he was closer to her age, was her husband’s brother—my biological father.

I’d blamed them for creating a monster, for turning the woman who’d birthed, a woman who was supposed to love me and protect me unconditionally, into someone I didn’t recognize. But they weren’t to blame. Because even now that they were both gone, here she stood, doing everything in her power to ruin me.

Tears fall down my cheeks as I stare at her in disbelief. Her long hair, now a short sleek straight bob, frames her face and delicate features. Clear blue eyes that resemble mine yet look hauntingly empty and void of any emotion as she looks at me. A vile smirk teases her red lips as she watches me cry, a triumphant gleam in her eyes when she realizes she’s won. She’s broken me down beyond repair, ruined whatever hope I had left, extinguished the fire that burned within me just a moment ago when I’d first arrived, ready to rain hell on Enzo from threatening the man I love. But her, how am I supposed to stand against her? Despite everything that’s occurred between us, I can’t.

“Why mother?” I croak, my voice breaking as I try to hold back the sobs that ache to be let out. All it does is irritate her further.

Willa scoffs, rolling her eyes as she brushes off my pain. “Oh, don’t be so dramatic, Wynter. I needed the money. Not everything is about you regardless of what you believe.” Walking around me, she stands beside Luke, wrapping an arm around his neck and pulling him in for a kiss.

At the sight of them together, I can’t keep the bile down any longer. I crouch forward and hack up yellow bile and a mucus-like substance that only makes me that much more nauseated to see at my feet.

Willa turns, disgusted by what I’ve just done. “Oh God, child. What the hell is wrong with you?” she shouts, when suddenly, it dawns on her and her expression turns completely depraved. “Well, well, this is a surprise.”

Immediately, I know she’s realized I’m pregnant. Not that I’m showing, but the oversized hoodie and vomiting surely give away my current state. Fear cripples me as I feel an oncoming panic attack.

“That’s why he was here, isn’t it?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Last night, Damon came here. He found the card I’d written to you.” She pauses when I look at her, confused, not understanding what she’s talking about. “Of course you didn’t open it.” She sighs in exasperation. “The recent package we sent you—over a month ago, actually—told you everything you needed to know. If you had opened it, you wouldn't look so surprised.”

“Damon knows?”

“Yes. For how long? I’m not sure. He showed up last night looking for answers and we told him everything. The lies, the deceit, everything about your husband and how you killed him before running back into his arms.”

“I didn’t kill Enzo,” I cry out.

“Yeah, well, as far as Damon Drake knows, you did. He told us about your fake arrangement. Your scheming and the relationship you all but forced him into with the excuse of appeasing me. I didn’t really plan on marrying you off. I just needed a Plan B in case the blackmail and extortion of threatening to turn you over for the murder of Enzo didn’t work out the way we’d planned.”

“But how, how did you and Luke have time to come up with this?”

“Oh sweetie, this has been going on long before you even realized it.”

“No,” I refuse to believe it, but her words, the way she says them with such conviction, prove it’s the cold hard truth. “You knew. You knew Enzo was coming for me and you let him take me?”

For a second, I almost catch a flash of guilt in her eyes, but it doesn't last.

My anger burns inside of me, every flame of rage igniting further and raging rampant the more I let the truth sit with me. She was the culprit in all of this. In the three years I spent as his prisoner, forced to do things I wanted no part of, to witness the cruelty and the vileness of his world. “You could have stopped him, mother, could have saved me from the monster, yet instead you let your hatred of me ruin my life.”

“Don’t sound so surprised. You’re foolish to think I had any part in that. I’d be signing my death sentence if I stood in the way of a man with that much power. No one can stop the Marchesis when they put their mind to something. Your father paid the price of thinking he could cross them.”

“We’re just lucky they haven’t discovered what truly happened to Lorenzo Marchesi.” Luke takes my mother’s hand in his and brings it up to his mouth to place a soft kiss, like he didn’t just confess to murder.

The strange thing is she acts like it means nothing to her. It’s obvious she’s only using Luke and doesn’t actually care about it. There is no one in the world Willa Servite cares about except for Willa Servite. And this poor fool is just another pawn in her game.

Ignoring Luke’s tender advances, Willa keeps her focus on me, taking a few steps forward to close the distance between us. She reaches for me, trying to lay a hand on my stomach, but I flinch and pull away, not only because I want her hands nowhere near me or my baby, but also remembering I’m hiding a gun on me.

She laughs, “But you getting pregnant, well that was unexpected.” She sounds almost proud, as if I'd purposely done it to trap Damon. “Tell me, dear, does Damon know? Is that truly why he came to me, to confirm if it is in fact his? I must say, Luke seemed pretty convincing when he told him the tale about the history between the two of you.”

“There is no history.” This angers Luke, but he keeps his composure. “You were no virgin before him, and although I've heard your marriage to Enzo was unconventional, it doesn't mean you’re in any way innocent. Sweetheart, you’ve gone soft hanging around that bunch of heathens and forgotten your previous reputation? Not to mention since Damon has some history of his own, it took little convincing.”

“What are you talking about?”

I jolt in surprise when another set of heels clicks on the floor behind me, causing me to turn abruptly and almost lose my footing. It had been years since I’d seen the woman, but there’s no mistaking who she is. Clarissa O’Neal had been a constant presence in my life growing up. Not that I had any sort of relationship with her, but as one of my mother’s best friends, if you could even call their petty rivalry that.

“Hello Wynter, it’s been awhile.”

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