Page 194 of Ripped Veil (Ripped Bratva)
I nod and raise the package in my hands. “I got your gift.”
My parents exchange a glance. “Come in here,” Papa orders, slowly gaining back his composure.
I step inside. The house is completely unchanged but I know I’m looking at it differently. Where once I saw it in color, there’s now only black and white.
They walk me into the living room, and I take a seat on one of the handcrafted chairs. I perch on its edge, wary and trying not to let the nostalgia drown me.
“What are you doing here?” Papa asks, looking at me with pure exhaustion coloring his gaze.
I frown. “Like I said, I got your package.”
They both stare at the box as I set it on the heavy wooden center table.
“We didn’t send you that,” Mama says. “Why would we send you anything? And how? We didn’t know where you’d gone.”
I flinch at that, even though I probably deserve it. “You didn’t send me this box?”
“No,” Papa says impatiently. “What’s in it?”
“A… a paperweight,” I say dumbly.
“That’s ridiculous,” Mama says, anger flashing across her eyes. “Why would we send you that?”
I’d been so sure it was my parents. But if not them, then who? I stare back and forth between the two of them, feeling completely lost.
“I… I… need to know if anyone else in the commune is trying to… to… threaten me?” I ask, tripping over my words.
My parents exchange another look.
“We don’t know anything,” Papa replies carefully. “But if someone is trying to threaten you, it’s probably deserved.”
My fingers have started to tremble. “Mama, Papa—”
“How could you!?” Mama explodes without warning, as though she can’t hold in her hurt any longer. “You had the world in your palm! You were to be married to the shepherd of our community! You would have had comfort and security and… and alife.”
“I have a life now.”
“A life?” Mama repeats. “You abandoned the Sanctuary. You turned your back on your family. You are condemned, Elyssa Redmond.”
That word:family. Why does it feel wrong coming out of her mouth?
“Mama, what ever happened to Miriam?”
“Who?”
Other names come flooding back to me. “Miriam,” I repeat. “Or Rebekah. Or Beulah. Or…”
I can see all their faces in my memory. Eyes studded with tears. Cheeks reddened with rage and sorrow. Each of them dragged away one by one and sent… where? Where were they sent? Why were they taken?
Her eyes go wide. “What? Why are you asking about them? They were exiled from the Sanctuary. Just as you were. You shouldn’t be here, Elyssa.”
Papa must see me flinch at the harshness of the wordexile.“Are you shocked by that?” he asks with condescension. He shakes his head. “You humiliated us all. We are paupers now because of what you’ve done. Cursed. Marked.”
I stiffen. I want to fight back, defend myself. But I can feel the old ways slipping back through my pores.
You never spoke back to your elders, especially not your parents. A part of me is still trapped in the girl they molded me to be.
“I… I’m sorry, Papa,” I say, looking down. “I don’t know what happened that night. I can’t remember—”
