Page 12 of The Alpha King's Fate

“She stopped being your little girl when you stopped taking care of her,” she growled. “Britney doesn’t need you.”

“And is that what she told you?” Gerald snarled. “Or are you once again making decisions for her like she’s still a little girl?”

Did he resent her for that? She couldn’t believe what Gerald implied, even though Brit accused her of the same thing when she tried to stop Rebecca from seeing her.

“I had to step up and be the responsible one,” she hissed, stepping forward so she was right in front of Gerald. “I made decisions that I would have never made if you had been the parent you were supposed to be. Go back from whatever hole you crawled out from and leave Britney alone.”

“I haven’t seen her in over a year!” Gerald shouted. “That man and his half-brained bodyguards kept me away; you had no right to do that.”

“As opposed to selling her to a mobster?” she asked.

Gerald had the grace to look remorseful, but she’d always known that he only planned for Costas to take one of his girls.

“Bring her to me; she can tell me herself if she doesn’t want to see me.”

“This is the last time you’ll see me, Gerald. And you will never see Brit again. Consider us dead. I will leave very strict instructions with the security about what they should do to you if you ever step foot in this hotel again.”

She turned to walk away from him, hopefully for the last time in her life, but Gerald grabbed her arm and pulled her back.

“You can’t do that to me! I’m her father—”

His shouting was cut off when Jackson grabbed his arm and twisted it behind him. Gerald yelped in pain and immediately shut up when he realised who had him.

“You said I could see her in a year,” Gerald whispered.

She could see the tears forming in her father’s eyes and felt the wave of pain that came with them.

“You said she would come back to me. But she just disappeared. I’ve been looking for her everywhere,” Gerald continued. “If I’d known, I wouldn’t have taken your money.”

Her eyes snapped up to meet her mate’s gaze.

Her father’s words whirled around in her head as she sensed Jackson’s guilt. How could he have offered that when he knew what this man did? When he was the one to rescue them in the first place?

After the deal, she was supposed to have taken Brit away to start afresh somewhere else. Why the hell would he have made any such deal with Gerald? And why give him any money at all?

“Layla... Your eyes...” Gerald whispered.

She lowered her gaze and turned to walk out of the room. The Head of Security was still outside; he opened the main doors for her when she approached him.

“Layla, wait.”

She couldn’t even look at him, much less stop to have a conversation. It had been almost two years since Jackson took her to his home. In all that time, he hadn’t found a moment to tell her what happened?

‘Sorry, Layla. I gave your useless addict father some money to get him off my back until I could give Britney back to him.’ Or ‘Sorry, Layla, I bought you from your father.’

Something. Anything so she wouldn’t find out like this. Jax did many other horrendous things to her before he marked her, so why had he kept that a secret?

“Layla.”

Did he even know what her father would have done with that money? He wouldn’t have paid his debts or his bills. He would have hit up the first bar he saw and found a dealer. Gerald and money didn’t mix well, not since Rebecca left him. He could have ended up dead in a ditch somewhere.

And that was probably the root of her ridiculous anger and contradictory emotions. Her feelings for her parents were always volatile, but she had still been there for Gerald. She’d fed and clothed him, cleaned up his vomit, or dressed his wounds when he’d been in a fight. Despite knowing he didn't like looking at her, she cared for him as if she were the parent.

With a large amount of money, Gerald could have died, and she would never have known.

She weaved through a group of security personnel and continued walking to the main doors with her head down. Jax’s betrayal felt like a claw dug deep into her heart, twisting and squeezing until it was ready to explode.

If he had just told her, then she would have...

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