Arranged to the Don, Freed from the Lie novel · Chapter 11 of 24

Chapter 11: What He Didn't Say

"Two years," I said.

I got to my feet with the minute book against my chest.

"Two years you've known there's no rule. Two years you watched me count down to Friday, and you let me think I was walking into a family tradition."

"I did."

"You sat on my desk and laughed."

"Helena."

"You laughed, Santino."

"Because I was terrified," he said.

It stopped me.

He stayed in the doorway with his hands at his sides, and he did not move closer.

"I own the mortgage on this house. I own the dock loan and the fleet note. I bought every piece of paper your family owed, one at a time, so that when the Council tried to collect you, there would be nobody left to collect for."

"You bought my family."

"I bought time."

"You could have told me."

"And said what?" His voice rose for the first time. "That I own your mother's roof? That I own the stipend your sister lives on? You'd have heard one thing, and it would have been the same thing the old man heard in that hall. That a Carraro had paid for you."

"That's not what I would have heard."

"Isn't it?"

I opened my mouth, and nothing came out.

I had stood in that Great Hall and believed he had sold me, in front of my whole family.

"I thought you signed it," I said.

"I know."

"You didn't."

"No."

"And you said, I don't buy women, and I heard that you didn't want me."

His face changed.

"That's what you heard?"

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