Page 27 of Jael

Danny shrugged. “I’m just here to find the truth.”

“The truth? Right.” She scoffed. “You and I both know that my father has never been interested in the truth, so don’t pretend you believe him. When you said you’d changed, I didn’t realize it was for the worse.”

His face darkened, losing the boyish charm he’d always had. “There’s a lot you don’t know. Don’t assume you know me either.”

“I don’t know that I knew you back then. But nothing’s changed for me.”

“That’s not how it looks. When I left, you were working exclusively for your dad. Doing more of his dirty work than you wanted to. He said you—never mind. It doesn’t matter.”

“He said I what?”

“He gave me more insight into what it must have been like to be raised by him.”

“You say that like you didn’t know.”

“Maybe I didn’t want to believe things were as bad as they appeared.”

“Yeah, well, they were worse.”

“I’m sorry.”

She shrugged. “I do what I can with the life I have left.”

“Helping women in domestic violence situations.”

“Yes.”

“That’s good. I always knew you had that in you— Sorry. I did it again.”

“Just because I do good things for people doesn’t make me a good person. It doesn’t erase what I’ve done.” She pressed her back into the seat. She hadn’t meant to say that, but she saw something in Danny’s eyes. Like he already knew. Maybe he really did know what was going on inside her head, but she couldn’t make sense of that after the way he’d treated her.

“Is that why you do it?”

Jael sighed. “Everything I’ve ever done in my life has been for duty, whether to my father or something else. I don’t know any other way of living life. But at least now I’m helping people instead of hurting them.”

“I don’t think you can compare your foundation to working for your dad.”

“But it doesn’t matter because nothing’s changed in my life. Whether it’s my dad or now Christopher, I’ll forever have to jump through hoops to keep the funding.”

“Is that what you do?”

She hated that he sounded so sincere. “Like I said, everything is for duty. But Vita Nova is not a cult, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“That’s what your dad said.”

“I know.”

“Is there no way for you to raise the money other than having to beg for it from Heber Industries? It would give you the distance you need.”

“I tried. I couldn’t get enough. And there were too many restrictions. This way, I can run Vita Nova the way I want. And I’ll do whatever I have to in order to keep the doors open, even though my father hates this place and has now hired you to tear it down.”

“He doesn’t like the time it takes away from other things. Could you maybe lessen your focus here?”

“It has nothing to do with that. He doesn’t like it because he can’t control me the way he wants. Although he’s staring a gift horse in the mouth. It offers him numerous opportunities to manipulate me into doing what he wants just to keep the funding going. He does it all the time. I don’t know why he can’t see how this works for him.”

“I’m sorry it’s like that.”

Jael turned to face him. “What are you doing?”

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