Page 32 of Poison and Wine
“You joined the order to escape an arranged marriage.”
Nervous laughter trilled from my lips. “That’s absurd. If I didn’t want to get married, I could’ve just run away.”
Callum shook his head. “You know as well as I do you were a caged animal, Kitten. If you had ever managed to escape, they would’ve dragged you right back. Even if you changed your name or your hair or even went to the extreme and got plastic surgery, they would’ve eventually found you and forced you back.”
When I didn’t respond, he quirked his brows at me. “The only choice you had at any freedom was to join the order. Even a man with a soul as black as your father’s still harbors a little fear of God, and he would fear him too much to steal you from Him.”
“How could you possibly know?” I whispered.
Anguish marred Callum’s handsome features. “Because of my sister.”
“What do you mean?”
“The reason why I killed my father was because he promised our seventeen-year-old-sister to a pedophile whose kink was beating young girls.”
“He sounds like Carmine,” I murmured.
“Except he didn’t get the chance to actually hurt you like Oisinn did my sister.”
My breath hitched in my chest. “That’s why you killed your father?”
“Aye.” His fingers traced the rim of his whiskey glass. “My brothers and I tried to talk him out of the arrangement, but he wouldn’t listen to reason. When Maeve threatened to run away to avoid the marriage, he ordered Dare, Quinn, and I to beat her.”
I widened my eyes in horror. “That’s horrible.”
“It was. Of course, we refused, which only enraged my father further.”
“Is that when you killed him?”
A haunted look entered Callum’s dark blue eyes. “I should’ve done it then. If I had, it would’ve saved Maeve from what he allowed that bastard Oisinn to do to her.”
I gasped. “He beat her in your stead?”
Agony overcame Callum’s face. The emotions swirling within him must’ve been overwhelming because he didn’t speak for several moments. The anguished whisper that came from him caused my stomach to roll. “He destroyed her.”
My hand flew to my mouth as I fought the bile rising in my throat. No, it couldn’t be. A father could never willingly allow such a thing to happen to his daughter. “Your father let him…” Unable to say the word, I swallowed hard. “Hurt her?”
Callum gave a slight jerk of his head. “Instead of protecting her in her hour of need, the bastard held a gun to Kellan and my youngest brother, Eamon’s, heads and forced them to hold her down while Oisin raped her.”
Desperate agony rippled through my chest as I didn’t fight the tears streaking down my cheeks. I swallowed my sobs as I couldn’t even form thoughts to imagine the horrors that Maeve endured at her father’s bidding. Then I thought of sweet Kellan being forced to do such a thing, and a sob tore from my lips. My heart broke for him as well.
Callum had been made out to be a monster for murdering his father when all this time he’d merely been avenging his sister. After wiping my cheeks, I reached out with a shaky hand to touch his shoulder. At the touch, he stared at me in surprise. “Callum, there’s nothing I can possibly say, but please know I’m so very sorry. For Mave and for Kellan and Eamon.” I swallowed hard. “And for you.”
He cocked his brows at me. “Does that mean you absolve me of the sin of killing my father?”
“While it’s not for me to forgive, you had more than enough reasons to do it.” When I thought of the torture Maeve had endured and the potential that I faced with Carmine, I whispered, “More than that, I’m glad you did it.”
“You are?”
I nodded. “I know my brothers would do the same.”
Tilting his head at me, he said, “I didn’t think things were so strained in your family.”
“Let’s just say that when it comes to my father, they’re willing to do exactly what you did.” To Callum's surprise, I said, “They’ve always hated the idea of me in the order. They were willing to take my father out to give me my freedom.”
A smirk curved across his lips. “I can imagine I just made three new enemies then by kidnapping you.”
“I would imagine you have.”