Page 60 of Broken Surrender
Desmond wrenched out of her grip. “I don’t care.”
Corinne sent a pleading look to me, but I shook my head. “Don’t worry about it,” I whispered. “I’ll take care of it.”
She nodded, then went back to the basement. I followed Desmond to his bedroom. He closed the door behind us.
“About the email address,” I said. He threw up a hand, dismissing it.
“She no longer has one,” he said.
“But you—”
“You arenother parent. You don’t know what will keep her safe.”
I shut up, my eyes on the floor. He was right; I was wrong—at least when it came to that. The anxiety swelled inside of me, my limbs shaking. I stared out the windows to his balcony. Had he ever looked through those glass panes, thinking of me?
“What I did was inappropriate,” he said. His head shifted toward the windows too. “I shouldn’t have hit that wall. It was—” he bowed his head, “—a failure, on my part.”
Those words vibrated through me. It took me back to one of the last times John had hurt me.What I did was uncalled for,he had said.I shouldn’t have done that to you.They were all the same. Aaron. John. Desmond.
How would Desmond hurt me this time?
“If you’re sorry—” I paused. He hadn’t apologized. I rephrased it: “If you want me to believe you, then answer me: did you work for Shin & Co Inc?”
His eyes locked with mine. “It was years ago,” he said.
“How did Corinne get involved?”
He scrubbed a hand over his face, wrinkles in his brow showing his frustration. “I wasn’t aware of what would happen.”
“How?” I asked. The ache was heavy in his shoulders, but he didn’t move. “What did Shin & Co Inc tell you?” I asked. “What exactly did you think would happen to Corinne?”
“They said it was a clinical trial for anxiety in girls. That they needed more participants her age.” He tugged at his collar. “Since Corinne had exhibited symptoms of anxiety, I thought it would help her.”
“So youdidn’tdo your own research on the actual trial?”
His nostrils flared. “I did.”
“Not hard enough apparently.” I shook my head. “I may have been a normal, everyday person before I married John, but I know when a business is shady. You can’t tell me you believed that Shin & Co Inc was clean.”
His jaw clenched. “I made it part of the agreement that they would let me in on the entire process.”
“And?”
“They took her from school. Without my permission.”
My heart dropped to my toes. Part of me wanted to hold him, to comfort him, to tell him that there were some things that we couldn’t help, and the other part of me wanted to stomp my feet and scream at him for letting it go. For betraying her. For betraying me.
But then it dawned on me, the one aspect of the story that made it all fall into place: Desmond had offered her to Shin & Co Inc.
Like he had offered me to the Marked Blooms Syndicate.
“Youvolunteeredher for the experiments,” I said. I smacked a hand to my mouth. “How could you do that? How could you give up your own sister?”
“I was told it was for anxiety in adolescents—”
“Ignorance isn’t an excuse.”
“I know that.” He bared his teeth. “I’ve dedicated my life to making this right. But here you are.” He leered so hard it made me cringe. “I let my guard down and everything goes wrong.”
