Empire of Desire(Empire #1)(104)

“No!”

“Gwen, listen to me—”

“No, you listen to me. If Mom had aborted me, I wouldn’t be here, I wouldn’t have known you, and I wouldn’t have been born as your daughter. She was fourteen and had every right to want to get rid of me. She was younger than me, a damn kid, and look at how far she’s come. This is my life, my body, and I have the right to decide whether or not I want to have a baby now, ten years from now, or never. I decide what’s right for me, not you or anyone else, Dad.”

“Fine, come here.” I walk to her and pull her up by the shoulders because she’s shaking. Fucking hell. Nate was right. I am scaring her; I’m scaring the only person who’s ever meant something to me.

She starts crying as she holds on to me, and that fucking shitty feeling resurfaces.

The feeling that I might have screwed things up as a father. That when it mattered, I wasn’t there for her as I should’ve been.

“Angel, stop crying. You know I hate it.”

“I can’t.”

“Gwen…I only want what’s best for you.”

“Daddy, can’t you see?” She lifts her head and stares at me with those expressive fucking eyes that stab me in the soul.

I’ve been taking care of her for such a long time that I didn’t realize she really isn’t a kid anymore.

She’s a woman now, my Gwen, and she has feelings—lots of them, as she said.

Fuck.

When did she grow up this much? It was easier when she was young. When she used to cling to me and tell me she didn’t really need superheroes because she already has me—her own superhero that she doesn’t have to share with anyone else.

And for a long time, I truly believed I was the only one she needed, but I’m learning the hard way that she has another superhero now. One I didn’t see coming, though I really should have.

I should’ve suspected something when she started hiding and blushing around him and he tactfully avoided coming to my house.

I should’ve suspected something when she started collecting his things and forbidding anyone from touching them. I thought she only idolized Nate, I could’ve never guessed that her feelings for him would grow so deep that she’d be in physical pain due to being separated from him.

“See what?” I ask.

“He’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me since you, and if you weren’t so blinded by your anger, you’d see it, too.”

“So now you’re replacing me?”

“You’re my father. He’s my husband. Neither of you can replace the other. So please, please stop hurting me, Dad. I beg you.”

Well, fuck.





38





Nathaniel





I knew this would be hard, but I didn’t think it would be this fucking unbearable.

There’s always been an emptiness inside me—it comes with all the baggage of being an unwanted child. But I’ve managed it well through the years.

Or, I thought I had.

Turns out, I was only numbing it with no way to effectively deal with it. Which is why I’m here, in the middle of nowhere.

On the mountain.

I’ve done a lot of hiking and thinking, mostly about her.

The girl I left behind without a word because her dick of a father is testing me.

“Stay away for a while and take the time off as an overdue vacation,” he told me that day. “If she’s really serious about you, she won’t move on. But if she does move on, you will fuck off from her life.”

He also wants ten percent of my shares, which will give him the majority in W&S. We agreed to never sell our shares to outsiders or each other in order to keep an equal power balance. But he’s using the circumstances to twist my arm.

I agreed anyway. Fuck the shares and the firm; they don’t matter compared to her.

His other conditions included never letting her know where I was, talking to her, or even giving her any type of an excuse. The fucker wants her to be angry at me for ghosting her and hopes that will eventually make her forget about me.

But he sometimes forgets that she’s as headstrong as he is.

If she wants to leave me, she’ll do it on her own terms, not because of whatever the fuck he’s doing.

That doesn’t deny that the current situation is pure fucking torture. Being cut off from her bright smiles, easy laughter, and cheerful presence is similar to dying slowly. It’s different from when King first found out. At least then, I could see her at the firm and make sure she was all right.

Now, it’s a blank slate.

Now, I hang on to scraps of my memories of her and how she felt in my arms. I think of the colors she injects into my life and try not to let them darken like my soul.

It’s fucking hard, though. And on bad days, like today, it becomes almost impossible. The black ink I carefully locked inside me is spilling onto those colors and smudging them.

I take a swig of my water as I hike down from the peak. That’s all I’ve been doing lately, hiking and thinking about her. Then getting hard and fucking my hand to the memory of her tight heat.

Then I go through her social media like some sort of fucked-up stalker, just to make sure she’s all right. But she hasn’t posted anything for two weeks. Not even any fangirling updates about her favorite Twenty One Pilots or NF song of the week. Not even a throwback picture of when King took her to their concerts for her sixteenth birthday.