Page 127 of Theirs to Rule

My brain raced, and I tried to slow my thoughts into something I could handle. “It was you, wasn’t it? You had Silas kill Ava.”

Surprise flickered through his eyes. That was the last thing he’d expected me to say, but he recovered quickly and barked out a laugh while I kept talking.

“Why?” I choked out.

“Because the bitch thought just because I’d fucked her a few times, that meant she was invincible. That being pregnant would somehow save her, not doom her.”

My eyes bugged. Holy fucking shit. He’d been sleeping with Ava?

I shook my head. It was sick. Beyond sick. But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. I knew she had been involved with an older guy, and of course she wouldn’t have wanted me to know that she was involved with my own father...

“No,” I whispered, my heart sinking. “That can’t be true.”

“Why, because she was such a good friend to you?”

“No, because you are my father,” I murmured, tears welling in my eyes. “I can’t believe you’d betray me like that. And you killed her to hide your dirty little secret? To hide the fact you knocked up a nineteen-year-old girl?”

“Oh please,” my father said. “You make it seem like I was the only one with a motive. Who knows if it was mine or Silas’s kid she was carrying. Killing her worked out best for the both of us.”

“Itdidn’twork out for Silas,” I spat out, anger and disgust coating my words. “And it sure as hell won’t work out for you.”

“Empty threats as usual,” he said. “But you are right, it didn’t exactly work out for me.”

The toxic tone of his voice seeped into my skin.

“They didn’t appreciate me ordering Silas to kill Ava, or maybe it was more that they didn’t appreciate me doing it without permission, so they decided punishmentswere in order.”

“They?You mean the group linked to that tattoo on your ass? The group that’s ‘cause’ somehow hinges on making Three Tier students vanish?”

My father snorted. “You sure have begun to think of yourself as an amateur detective, haven’t you?” My father let out a frustrated chuckle as his grip tightened on Elise. “You had themscared, too. That’s why my punishment would have served them, too. My meddlesome failure of a middle daughter dealt with, a punishment for me and a nuisance for them done away with.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Tears began to fall down my cheeks as my father glared at me. Had he hated me all this time?

“But no,” he continued. “You’re such a failure that you couldn’t even get kidnapped right without everything going to shit. And because of that, I had to lose the one daughter I had with any damn drive in her.”

His words crushed me. He must be talking about the attempted kidnapping at the river that Ty had stopped. And because that had failed, Bianca had been taken?

“The only one I had left was Elise, but because you two have been talking, I can’t take chances on her either. Angus…”

Angus loosened his grip on me for a microsecond and I seized my opportunity, whipping around and kneeing his crotch. Angus howled in pain and fell to his knees, letting go of me as he staggered backwards.

In one fluid motion, I round kicked him in the head, sending him smashing into the ground while I pulled the gun Kage had bought me from my back waistband. Immediately, I shot Angus in the chest before I aimed the gun at my father’s head. Shock registered in my father’s eyes, but he quickly covered it with a smile even as he pulled Elise close to him and produced a knife, holding it at her throat.

God, no!

“Really, Cami? We all know you can’t shoot for shit.”

“Let her go, or I will shoot,” I hissed at him, my hands shaking.

“And risk shooting your sister instead of me?”

He lifted the blade like he was going to plunge it into Elise.

I took a breath, focused on what Kage had taught me at the shooting range, and fired.

My father jerked back as the bullet entered his forehead. He slumped forward, falling into a heap on the floor. Blood pooled around him as he stared lifelessly at the ceiling, a black hole in his skull where the bullet had entered. My legs were shaking as I stepped over him and pulled a sobbing Elise into my arms.

“Shh, it’s okay. Everything is okay,” I soothed her, kissing her on the forehead. “We need to get out of here.”

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