Page 225 of Her Daddies' Everything

“No, but I was weak. Scrawny. I couldn’t fight back physically, I had to just take the beatings he dished out when I refused to help him. I swore to myself that if we ever got free of the cult, I’d get myself into a position where no one could hurt me again. Where none of us would ever be reliant on anyone else.”

“And you did that,” Immy said.

“Yeah. But . . . shit. It has never been enough, you know?”

“No. What do you mean?” she asked, confused.

“When we left the cult we had nothing. Our parents relied on charity and I hated it. I wanted better for all of us. I hated all of us being separated. And then we all moved into that house together. Remember it?”

“Yeah, I loved that place,” she said.

Jenner blinked, giving her a shocked look. “What do you mean, you loved it? That place was shit. There was mold growing inside. It was so damp and cold and in a terrible area of town. We wouldn’t even let you walk around outside on your own. And you were always getting sick.”

“Yeah, that part wasn’t much fun,” she said, turning to look at Tobias. “The mold was terrible. It would get into my lungs and I’d get bronchitis or pneumonia.”

“I needed to get us out of there. Get you out of there,” Jenner said. “It wasn’t safe for you there. I can’t believe you liked it.”

“I didn’t like being ill all the time,” she told him. “But I liked the fact that we all spent a lot of time together. I got to take care of you all. I got to see you all every day. Now, I don’t see any of you that much.” Shoot, she shouldn’t have said that. “Sorry.”

“Immy, you don’t have to apologize every time you say something that you think will upset me,” Jenner told her.

“I don’t like to upset you, though.” She didn’t like upsetting people, but especially the two of them.

“Yeah? You don’t worry when you put slime in my shoes, or fake dog puke in my bed, do you?” Jenner asked.

“That’s different.”

“Why? Because your Little does those things?” Jenner guessed. “And your Little doesn’t feel bad about creating mischief?”

“I don’t think I want to reply to that.” But it wasn’t something she’d actually considered. Did her Little play those pranks?

Maybe.

And was that why she didn’t feel guilty when she did those things?

Also, maybe.

Every other time that she’d say or do something she then regretted, she’d feel so bad. But maybe in Little headspace, she didn’t feel so guilty.

“All I wanted was to get us out of there,” Jenner told her. “To make us secure. To ensure that no one could ever have control over us again. I figured that to do that, I needed money. So I started to do whatever I could to push my career. Recording songs, doing gigs. When things started to take off and we moved, I thought I might have felt better. But the pressure mounted. Everyone’s jobs except for Isaiah’s, Maeve’s, and Cat’s depended on me being successful, on me staying successful. I wanted to ensure that you all had what you needed. So I had to make myself more famous, earn more money. I needed to feel in control, not of all of you, but of the world. And to be in control, you need money.”

“Oh, Jenner. Why did you never tell us any of this?” she asked, horrified by all the worry and stress he’d taken on his shoulders.

“I couldn’t. I know you guys would have tried to reassure me, but I felt like everything was my burden to bear. That’s why I hired Lauren. I thought she could take my career to the next level, so we’d never have to worry about anything again. And she did, but it took me away from you all the time and I hated that. Christ, if I’d known that she was actively trying to keep us apart . . . ”

“I wish we’d known how stressed you were,” she told him. “So you were trying to grow your career so we’d all be secure, so you felt more in control of the world around us.”

“Yeah, but . . . there’s more. I wish that was it, but it’s not. And this part is worse. My father wasn’t just abusing me physically.”

“What do you mean?” she whispered.

She tried to sit up, letting out a small moan of pain.

Jenner grasped hold of her shoulder. “What are you doing?”

“Trying to sit up,” she pointed out grouchily. Shoot. Why did she sound like such a grump? That wasn’t her. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to sound grouchy.”

“You’re entitled to be a bit grouchy,” Tobias told her gruffly. “And you don’t have to apologize.”

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