Page 54 of Hers To Keep
“So eager, young one. Get comfortable, you’re in for a treat. When we were younger, we were all part of the same group of friends, your mother, your father, his girlfriend, me, and a few others you already know. But you see, just as Lilith was in love with him, I was in love with his girlfriend, Gianna. She was the perfect girl I was telling you about. Gianna was pure and beautiful, an angel who graced this world.”
“She was a stuck up, goody two shoes bitch,” sneers my mother.
“Semantics,” he answers back. “So we played a little game to get them to see they were no good for one another.”
“We used a little Devil’s Kiss, which was only in its early stages of production to make your father more susceptible to suggestion.”
“Who is my father?”
“Smoak. Maxwell Smoak. Silas Smoak’s youngest son. Malcolm Smoak’s younger brother. Alek and Drea’s Uncle Max. You, my dear, are a Smoak.”
Part One Epilogue
SCARLETT
What are you to do when the fucked-up life you thought you were living turns out to be the best-case scenario?
What happens when the evil you thought you’ve faced thus far turns out to be the least of your worries?
What if the hell you thought you were living in turns out to be more malevolent than you’d ever imagined possible?
What is left to do?
Who do you turn to when everyone seems to be on the other side?
What is to become of me when the only person left to turn to is the one I’ve aimlessly tried to push away?
What comes next?
Here comes the reckoning.
Part Two
Reckoning
“Tell me father, which to ask forgiveness for; what I am, or what I’m not?
Tell me mother, which should I regret; what I became, or what I didn’t?”
“thoughts of a stray iii” m.a.w. (via dvoyd)
Chapter
Thirty
SCARLETT
Maxwell Smoak is my father.
My mind is reeling, on the border of collapsing at the revelation. I can’t fathom the thought of it being true, let alone say it out loud. Because if it’s true, this changes everything. If it’s true, then this means these devils around me are even more destructive than I ever imagined possible. If it’s true, this means that the evil inside of me is even more powerful. It’s in my DNA, twice.
Their tainted and tarnished blood runs through my veins, bleeds from my wounds, and saturates every inch of my being. Because my mother is a monster, and although I never met my father, he’s part of this world, which can only mean he’s just like them. Or worse.
I stand frozen in place, my hearing distorted, my vision obscured by puddled tears, my mind besieged as my body goes completely numb. I mean how else is one to react to such a revelation.