Page 147 of Claiming Pretty

And for that, we’d ignored her. I’d ignored her.

She was the one who had insisted—insisted—I see Dr. Vale with his gaslighting and memory suppressors.

Her phone hadn’t been bugged when I called her from Mr. Buckley’s farmhouse.Shehad the call traced.She’d sent those men after me.

She was the only one, apart from Lisa and the twins, who had known where my new dorm room was the day I moved in.

And she was the one who had told the dean that Earl Grey was my favorite tea. That I’d supposedly gone sailing around Greece and Croatia. She was the one who had fed them details about me.

She had betrayed me.

The betrayal hit me harder than I thought possible, like a blade cutting through flesh and bone.

My heart lodged in my throat as my mind flashed back to just hours ago, to the moment I’d called herMafor the first time, to the way I’d whispered,I love you.

And my heart broke for the loss ofeverythingshe had been to me—my protector, my guardian, mymotherin every way that mattered.

My knees buckled, and I clutched the edge of the altar to steady myself, even as my mind screamed for escape.

“Did you ever love me?” The words slipped out before I could stop them, fragile and trembling in the thick silence.

Her gaze softened, her voice dropping so low it barely carried across the cold chamber.

“I did love you, Ava,” she murmured, almost wistful. “Imournedyou when I thought they’d killed you.”

My breath hitched as the pieces began to slot together.

She hadn’t been upset about somestupid surgerywhen I’d returned from Paris. She’d been upset because she thought the man sent for me had killed me.

Ebony hesitated, her shoulders shifting as if the weight of memory pressed down on her.

“You were just a girl when you came across my table. When my father forced me to…” Her voice cracked, the pain in it so raw it sliced through the haze of my fury.

The memory hit me like a physical blow, the images bright and vivid behind my eyes.

The surgical light glaring above me.

Her father’s deep voice.

And her pale-blue eyes, staring down at me over the surgical mask.Her eyes.

It was Ebony. She was the doctor. She was the one who’d performed my abortion.

My body shuddered with revulsion, and I fought to hold myself together.

“And when Adam died mere weeks later,” she continued, her voice turning steadier, colder, “I begged my father to let me have you, to keep you from falling into another one of their dirty hands.”

I wanted to scream, to rage at her, to demandwhyshe would do any of this. Instead, I managed, “Then why become High Lord?”

Her face hardened, her chin lifting as though she were justifying herself to a cruel and unforgiving judge.

“You have no idea the work I’m doing,” she said, her voice sharp with conviction. “I’mcleaning up the Sochai.”

Her posture straightened, a twisted kind of pride swelling in her tone, even as her quivering chin betrayed the weight of her delusion.

“My father let it rot, let it become a cesspool—a respectable guise for pedophiles and perverts. But I’m going to bring it into this century. The Sochai, with all its power and riches, will become a force for good instead of evil.”

I stared into her pale-blue eyes, eyes I had once trusted, once turned to for love and protection.

---