my teeth to hold in the cry of betrayal and disgust souring my mouth.
“Tell him,” I plead again, hot tears stream down my face.
“I’m so sorry.”
His apology cuts a deep wound. My knees give out from under me and I slide down the wood-paneled wall until my butt hits the ground. Nothing makes sense. I dig my palms in my eyes. Past moments flash behind my eyelids. Good memories. Were they all lies?
“Tell her who she is, Tobias.”
I lift my eyes, with one last silent plea that he didn’t lie to me my entire life even though the truth is written all over his face. Blinking through the tears, I wait for him to say something. Anything. His mouth opens and shuts a couple times.
Finally, he starts with, “I love you. You will always be my daughter.”
My eyes never leave his, even when Richard barks out a sadistic laugh. “Except she’s not. She was not yours to take,” he yells, slamming his hand down on the table, his patience running thin.
My dad doesn’t even flinch. “You were…” He pauses, swallowing hard. “You were one when I kidnapped you.”
My mouth gapes open, and I suck in a breath for oxygen to move through my system again. My head feels faint and I fight to stay conscious. Part of me wants him to stop. If I’m going to die anyway, I don’t want to know the truth. I want to die loving my dad.
But he doesn’t stop.
“Your…” he struggles to say the next word, “… father was the President of the United States. He was about to sign something into law that would put a very large industry out of business. A lot of powerful people in the world weren’t happy. They hired me to kill you. With help from Richard.”
“You bastard, I didn’t want this. I didn’t want to help! They made me. They threatened my family. It was them or her.”
The words run together after he said my father was the President. I can’t focus on anything other than that. It’s hard enough to keep breathing.
“But you failed,” snaps Richard. “And now you’ve ruined my life. Once this gets out, I’m over. Too many people are aware of her now. And if I go down, so are you.”
I scream as a gunshot rings out, echoing in my ear. My father crumbles over, catching himself on the arm of a chair. “Dad!”
As I crawl over to him, he mouths, “Stay there.” He grips his arm and blood runs around his fingers. Everything happens so fast, yet in slow motion. He pulls a knife out of his shoe and flings it straight at Richard. I gasp, digging my face into my arms, when it hits him square in the neck. Stomach bile threatens to come up at the sound of him gargling what I imagine is blood.
I try to block out the sounds, dreaming of the ocean. Free with nature, where there are no lies, only truths. But the only thing I can focus on is the sounds in the room. When a grunt meets a grunt, I peek up. My dad knocks Richard back, kicking the gun out of his hand.
Or, not my dad.
A killer.
“You… you just killed him,” I stammer, watching him search the room for something.
He sighs heavily. When he finds a bag, he picks it up and drops it on the counter, digs through it, and pulls out a shirt to wrap around his bleeding upper arm. It reminds me Richard shot him.
“Are you okay?” Worry mixed with fear keeps me frozen in place.
I don’t know him.
He groans as he tightens the shirt. “It’ll be fine. It was a clean shot.” I stare at him. What does that even mean? “Aspen, it was him or us. He was not letting us walk out of here alive.” His voice doesn’t carry an ounce of regret for what he did.
“You’re really a hitman?”
The last half-hour temporarily made me forget why we’re here to begin with. I guess getting shot and killing someone supersedes kidnapping someone and lying to them your whole life.
“So, do I call you Tobias or Rudy?” My voice drips with bitter distaste.
He blows out a ragged breath. “I’ll tell you everything. But I need to get you out of here. Just in case Richard had help.”
He digs into Richard’s pants pocket until he finds the handcuff key. When he offers his hand to help me up, I narrow my eyes. “Why should I trust you? You’re a