Page 36 of Danger Close (Mourningkill #3)

A Liar

Teri

The day of the wedding

He wasn’t listening. No one was listening . Anytime I tried, Joe dismissed me with a wave of his hand.

It was like those times I went to the police and was informed that I could ruin a good man’s career if I pressed charges. It was clear, no matter what I did, he’d be exonerated. They didn’t need a trial to rule he was innocent. He had a badge, a uniform. He was innocent, and I was a liar.

The world conspired to make me obedient to these men. I had no will of my own.

Even as I shook with terror, I would be thrown. I would be pushed.

I would be broken.

History would repeat itself, and it would always end the same.

Me. My skin raw from rug burns, my body aching, my core bleeding as Raymond Clark did whatever he wanted with his toy.

Except this time, it would not be Annie in an ER. It would be Trinity, or Cobra, or Charlotte. A dozen different people who made the mistake of letting me in, of trying to shield me from the fate that I was born with.

My birth trapped my mother to my father. For the sin of being born, I had trapped myself in this hell. There was no way out.