Page 22 of Mind Maze

A small sob escapes her, crushing my heart into a million pieces.

“I miss my daddy, my real one.”

“I know you do, sweetie.” I ache to hold her and comfort her, but I know she needs her space. “Do you feel safe now that Gareth and Vivienne are gone?”

She turns her tear-streaked face toward me, nodding emphatically.“Yes.”

“Is there more you want to tell me about Gareth?”

We sit in silence as the show plays on in the background. I wait patiently for her to continue. Finally, she does.

“The others just touched me. He was worse.”

Bile creeps up my throat. “Worse how?”

Rather than answer, she slips out of bed and walks over to her backpack. I watch as she retrieves her Ken doll and Barbie.As she stands beside the bed, yanking off both their outfits in fierce determination to explain, I want to cry out in rage, forcing her to stop.

She smacks the Ken against the Barbie, their naked plastic bodies clattering together, and mimics obscene sounds. When she’s finished, she adopts a deep voice as Ken tells Barbie what a good girl she is and makes sick kissing sounds as she makes his head go down her body. Then she throws Ken across the room. Barbie sticks her head under the pillow and cries so quietly. My heart is officially broken.

If Gareth weren’t already dead, I’d kill that pedophile, rapist motherfucker myself.

I wake to a chirping of my phone.

Groggy and confused as to where I am, I reach my arm out toward the sound, fumbling until I find it. It’s been plugged in—probably thanks to my fake, but sometimes considerate boyfriend—and it takes a second for me to unplug it.

Many missed texts await me.

Theo: Last night was messed up. Call me when you get this.

After that one, there’s another one.

Caius: Spend what time you need with Kaitlyn. Take her to breakfast and shopping if you feel like it. Or order in room service. Just be ready for tonight.

I rub at my eyes, taking in the suite I’m in. The bedroom door where Kaitlyn sleeps is locked and I crashed on the couch as promised. My nightmares were more memories than anything,brought up by the revelation I’d come to last night at Dad’s. Because of my terrible dreams, I feel as if I’ve barely slept.

Once I sit up, I yawn and force myself to reply back to Caius even though I want to go back to sleep.

Me: What’s tonight?

His response is immediate.

Caius: Good. You’re awake. Theo is driving me insane. I’m sending him up.

Me: What’s tonight?

One of my pet peeves is asking a question that doesn’t receive an answer. It’s how Dad was growing up, and still is, and Caius has a tendency to do the same. With Caius, though, I feel comfortable confronting him about it. I try not to entertain why that’s so. He’s still my enemy.

Caius: We’re having a birthday dinner for your stepmother. Both our families.Nothing’s been cancelled.

I’m already shaking my head as I tap out a response. I may care about Eva, but I can’t look at my father right now.

Me: No. We can go back home as far as I’m concerned.

Caius: I wasn’t asking.

It takes everything in me not to growl in frustration, but I don’t want to alarm Kaitlyn. Tossing my phone onto the sofa cushion beside me, I try to make sense of my plans from here. Betrayal seems as though it’s an everyday occurrence for me. First, it was Bastian and Megan. Now it’s Dad and what he tried to erase. I’m at a loss to where I go from here.

You can help them…

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