It all started with a game

Chapter 23

"Who was the boy you were with?" He asked.

I shook my head, gasping for air. "He's, he's no one."

"He didn't seem like no one. If I had to guess I'd say you were in love with this boy."

I shook my head frantically, keeping my eyes squeezed shut. "It's not serious."

"Oh please, I know you Violeta. You care about that boy."

"I don't," I lied. "He means nothing to me."

He tightened his hold on my throat, loud sobs escaping my lips as he did so. "So who is this boy who means nothing to you? What's his name?"

"He's nobody," I tried again. I couldn't tell him Ryder's name. I couldn't put Ryder in danger like that.

"Come on, tell me the boy's name. If he really means nothing it shouldn't be a big deal." He squeezed my throat, cutting off most of the air.

"Marx Jacobson!" I cried out desperately. "His name is Marx Jacobson." I condemned my classmate to a morbid death, my classmate who had been nothing but kind because his name was the only name I could think of on the spot.

"Marx Jacobson." He stroked my face, his dry and cracked hands scratching my skin. "Don't you think I should get to meet this boy, after all, he makes you really happy."

He had heard everything. He'd been watching us the whole time. How many other times had he been watching me and I hadn't noticed?

He continued, a coy smile curving his lips. "It only seems right that a girl's father gets to meet the boy that makes her so happy."

I wanted to beg him not to hurt Ryder, knowing that he very well could. But if I begged him, if I begged my father not to touch Ryder, that would only make things worse. "I was lying. He means nothing to me. I'm playing him."

"Oh yes, the game. I've heard much about that."

He knows about the game. He's been watching me this whole time. "I'm just trying to win. He means nothing to me," I gave it one last shot to try to save Ryder from the grips of my father.

"Relax, my little bumblebee," he used the nickname he'd always called me as a child. "I'm not here to interrogate you about the boy. I'm here to say goodbye."

My gasping breaths did not stop despite his words. I couldn't answer, my tears blocking my voice.

"I got into some bad things," he continued, "they're going to take me away soon. I won't be able to watch over you anymore, bumblebee."

He said it like it was a bad thing, like it wasn't his face that appeared in my nightmares at night.

"You're brothers will have to take care of you. But now that Klaus isn't so puny anymore, he can protect you."

He said it like Klaus hadn't spent all those hours at the gym to protect Sonny and I from him, to protect us from our own father. He was the reason for everything; it was why we were never allowed to stay home alone, why we often slept in Klaus's room, why we were too scared to walk home alone. Klaus learning how to fight was the only reason my father watched from a distance, because he knew Klaus would kill him if he came within six feet of any of us. But that didn't stop my father from breaking into our house in the middle of the night, or sending me a new book every month just to prove he knew where we were, or cornering me in a dark alley way the second I was vulnerable and alone.

"I came to say goodbye," he finished, kissing my forehead.

That was the worse part, when he kissed my forehead, because instead of all the horrible memories that had been replaying in my head before, when he kissed my forehead all I could thing about were all the times I fell and scraped my knee and he would clean it up, put a bandaid on it, kiss my forehead, and tell me that everything would be okay. It made it hard to hate him when I thought of times like those.