Chapter 24: The Plan (2)
Lucas didn’t sit. Didn’t collapse. He simply stood there, watching the fire dance like it could somehow burn the truth out of the air.
His limbs went cold—cold with the realization that his past life, his hell, his quiet unraveling had never been a tragic twist of fate.
It had been a plan.
Her plan.
Misty’s.
The only person he was supposed to trust. His own mother.
He could almost hear her voice now—sweet, perfumed, too light for the weight of the things she never said. The hand that smoothed his hair after each injection. The rehearsed lines about how special he was, how he had to stay patient, polished, and quiet.
Every kindness... had been an investment.
Every silence... protection for her interests.
And every failure he carried—his infertility, his heat that never came, the blame Velloran shoved onto his skin—wasn’t a failure at all.
It had been engineered.
His mind felt hollow. So hollow it hurt.