Page 355 of A University of Betrayal

“For fuck’s sake, give me your phone, Larissa!” Bay shouted angrily, and I could hear her talking to someone in the distance, but my focus shifted more and more to my father and the world around me slipped away from my consciousness.

“Hang on, okay? An ambulance will be here soon,” I said frantically, shaking him as his eyes closed until he opened them again.

Dad would get through this.He would make it.

My heart tightened further and further.

“My boy... You have to know...”

“Shhh,” I tried to calm him down. “Save your strength, please,” I begged him, but my father kept talking. “You need to know that I’ve been lying to you all these years.”

I couldn’t concentrate on his words.

“No,save your words,” I continued to beg.

He opened his dry lips. “Back then, this pretty blonde woman came to our door. She was so desperate.”

“What are you talking about?” I snapped at him, wanting him to just stop talking and keep his eyes open. But there was just this gleam in his eyes, tears...

Damn, why was my father crying now?

“I saw her again today, at the ball.” I stared at my father and tried to listen to him. More and more tears ran down my cheeks. “She had you wrapped up in a blanket back then.”

What was he talking about? Why couldn’t I understand him?

“You were still so little.God,you touched our hearts.”

“Dad,” I whispered, confused.

Why wasn’t he saving his strength?Why the hell was he talking?

“It was an honor to hold that title,” he said smiling through his tears, and I didn’t understand. I also started to cry harder and harder.

“Julian.”

Dad reached for my hand and I gripped it tightly because it was so shaky, cold, and weak... that it almost slipped out of my grasp.

Dad smiled with remorse in his eyes, and it broke my heart because I didn’t understand anything anymore, only that he was in pain.

“It’s time you find your mother.”

My breath hitched, and I looked at him in disbelief.

Mum was dead.

My father closed his eyes.

“Dad,damn it!”I screamed and shook him. I managed to get him to open his eyes again.

“Dad!Mum’s dead, don’t you remember?”

But my father shook his head. It was so slow and so desperate. Then he smiled again. His face was now paler than ever, his lips... blue, stained with blood.

“Julian, listen to me carefully. Her name...”

I heard everything around me stop.

“Your birth mother’s name is Tania Rolanow.”

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