Chapter TWENTY-FOUR

MEREDITH

“You’re just like your whore mother! Giving it away to every guy who blinks at you! Slut! You ruined everything!”

“Dad? What are you saying?”

“Dad? Don’t call me that! I’m not your father! I never was. Your whore mother tricked me. But look at you, Meredith. The evidence of another man’s DNA is written all over you.”

I cried. Shocked and horrified by what the man I thought was my father said to me.

His face was frightening. Sweat dotted his brow. A crazed sort of drunken madness glittered in eyes nothing like mine.

“You’re gonna write a note, telling him it was a just a game.”

“No!”

“Yes, you will. You’ll do it or Josef will die! I know people. You know I do. Now write!”

My hand shook as I held the pen and his fingers dug into the back of my neck as he held me in place. His breath stunk of booze, and it made me want to puke.

“Since you’re giving it away. Why not?” he grunted, pulling on the neckline of my shirt.