Page 25 of The Echo of Forever
“I’ll take all of this from you with the snap of my finger,” he whispered. “The broker delegates. Give the Cannon contract to someone else and focus on this alliance.”
He left, letting the command hang in the air as if it were final. Like I had to listen or else.
I snorted and perched up at the edge of my desk.
Fuck him.
Carmen didn’t say anything right away, but I felt her gaze on me as she grabbed a paper towel and pressed it into my hand.
I dabbed the blood dripping from my lip, pissed off knowing the cut there wouldn’t be healed before the gala.
“I don’t understand this change in you,” Carmen said after a while, now sitting on the arm of the couch across the room. “Eliel isn’t wrong. This job is barely yours. He can take it with one phone call, and we both know you don’t want that.”
She wasn’t wrong.
Being the Broker gave me more freedom than most. And while I did outrank my father on the surface, under it, he had way more pull within the society.
“Why do you keep doing this? You could just let it ride. Take the easy jobs and hand off the rest. Play the long game. But instead—”
I looked up, and she shut up fast.
“Because he won’t ever let me go,” I said, choosing honesty. “Not even if I do everything right. The only way to live is rebelliously.”
Carmen stood and walked toward me.
“He cares about you, you know,” she said. “He just doesn’t know how to show it.”
“That’s not caring. That’s ownership.”
She shrugged and walked toward the door, pulling it open but lingering in the opening.
“Maybe. But it’s the only thing you’ll ever get from him, so you might as well use it wisely. Be grateful you aren’t being auctioned off instead.”
Be grateful?
The door clicked shut behind her, and I closed my eyes. My fingers brushed the butt of my gun, and I slipped it from my waist.
Dying would be better than this,I thought, putting it to my temple.
The silence was so loud as I waited for the urge to awaken within me.
Do it, Forever.
You can’t be controlled if you’re dead.
Carmen returned at the right time.
“What the fuck, Forever,” she shouted, rushing over to snatch the heavy metal from my hand.
I tossed my head back and laughed.
“I wasn’t going to do it,” I told her, smiling wide. “Where’s the thumb drive I gave you?”
She nodded, eyes still wide as she held it up.
“That’s what I went to get.”
“Plug it into the monitor.”
