Page 77 of Victorious: Part 3

“And the male babies?” Maverick asks quietly, his voicedeadly calm.

Layla shrugs. “Useless. They’re taken elsewhere and ahh… well, bid on. Everything is worth making a profit on, am I right?”

The casual way she says it, like she’s talking about throwing out garbage, ignites rage through my chest. “You’re talking about selling innocent babies. Probably to the most heinous people in the world.”

“I’m talking about efficiency. I’m talking about capitalism,” she snaps back. “Something you never learned. Always too soft, too emotional. You should have learned more from your father. At leasthewas tough.”

“Don’t you dare—”

“Speaking of efficiency,” she continues, cutting me off, her eyes shifting to Maverick. “I know all about my daughter.Saaadie…” The way she sings her name like it’s a song makes me want to puke. “Heard she’s pregnant…” Her smile turns predatory. “When she has that baby, if it’s a girl, I’ll take her. Train her properly. The way Ishould havetrained my daughter from the beginning, instead of letting her grow up weak and useless.”

My world goes red around the edges. My mother, the woman who gave birth to me and Sadie, whom I spent years grieving, just threatened my sister and her unborn child with the same casual tone someone might use to discuss the weather.

The same woman who used to tell us that family is everything, that love was the most powerful force in the universe. She’d quote Elvis while braiding Sadie’s hair,‘Love me tender, love me true.’

What a fucking joke.

“You won’t touch my family,” Maverick snarls, taking a step toward her.

“Try and stop me,” she hisses back, and suddenly there’s a shiv in her hand. Makeshift but deadly sharp. I step in front ofMaverick, and Mom chuckles. “You think you canwaltzin here and threaten everythingI’vebuilt? You’re still thatpatheticlittle boy crying for his mommy.”

I move toward her again, but Maverick is faster. He lunges forward, grabbing her wrist, slamming her back against the concrete wall. The shiv clatters to the floor as they struggle, my mother laughing maniacally in Maverick’s face, and if I am not mistaken, barking at him like a rabid dog.

“Phoenix, grab her,” he grunts out, trying to keep her pinned.

But I can’t move.

I can’t breathe.

I can’t process what’s happening.

This woman, this monster, is my mother.

How did the woman who taught me that love could move mountains become someone who threatens to steal babies?

“You think I care about you?” she snarls at me while fighting Maverick’s grip. “You werenothingbut a burden. A reminder of everything I lost. I should have drowned you both when you were babies and saved myself years of misery.”

The words shatter something inside me.

Every doubt I’ve ever had about being worthy of love, every fear that I wasn’t good enough. For God’s sake, she’s just confirmed them all.

My own mother wishes I’d never been born.

But then Maverick’s voice cuts through the haze, “Phoenix, she’s got another shiv.”

I snap back to reality as Layla breaks free, lunging at Maverick with a second shiv she had hidden. The blade catches him across the chest, tearing through his leather cut, blood splashing across her blue jumpsuit. She cackles like a damn maniac at the same time Maverick groans, dropping back, clutching at his chest.

“No!” I move to help, but she spins toward me with the shiv raised. “I should finish what I started years ago,” she snarls,turning for me. A glint of metal shines in my peripheral, but I’m too stunned to think as my mother rushes for me, and just as she’s about to reach me, a deafening gunshot pierces the confined space, the bright flash illuminating from the same space in my peripheral. Layla jerks once, her eyes going wide with shock as blood splatters across my face in a flurry, disorientating me. I catch my breath, the shock hitting me as I watch my mother crumple to the concrete floor at my feet.

Blood pools beneath her head. I can’t hear anything, no noise, only a high-pitched ringing as my head swirls, making me dizzy.

I stare down at her body, my mind struggling to process what just happened.

My mother is dead.

The woman who gave birth to me, who I spent years believing was lost to drugs and despair, is dead on the floor of this nightmare chamber.

And I feel…