Текст книги "Desire in His Blood"

Автор книги: Zoey Draven

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Chapter 41

Azur

“Can I join you?” came the voice.

I barely heard the words but my eyes focused on Kaldur nonetheless. I was leaning against the terrace banister, watching the fishing boats dart in and out of the western port, which was hidden beyond the sharp curve of the cliff.

“What do you want?” I asked, no true venom in my voice. I looked over my shoulder, to the stretch of windows of Gemma’s rooms, where she’d retreated the night before. I’d slept without her for the first time since the kyriv attack, and it had left me restless.

It was nearly evening and despite my attempts to see her, she’d been sleeping every time I’d barreled past Ludayn. She hadn’t eaten anything, given the full trays of food still laid out on the table in the sitting room.

I was fucking worried about her. And I didn’t know what I could do to help her through this.

“Everything has changed in the span of moments,” she’d whispered to me last night, once the video feed had cut out. “I—I don’t know what to do, Azur. And I’m so—so incredibly sorry. For Aina. And I don’t know how to make it right. Why?”

The vulnerable hitch in her voice had nearly torn my chest to shreds.

Kaldur took his place next to me. I caught Kythel strolling along the terrace wall, but my twin gave us privacy and space, continuing on his way down toward Mother’s gardens when he noticed us.

I didn’t know what had happened last night after the ballroom. I didn’t know what had happened when Kythel had gone after Kaldur after his outburst.

Truthfully, I didn’t care. What I cared about was that Gemma now knew the truth and she’d hardly been able to look at me since.

“Kalia told me your wife has fallen ill,” Kaldur said.

My shoulders stiffened. “My wife’s name is Gemma,” I said, my tone wooden, though I turned my glare to him in full force. “You would do well to remember it.”

“Gemma,” Kaldur amended quietly. “I didn’t come here to fight with you, despite what you might think.”

“Then why did you come?”

“What I did last night…I’m sorry for it, Azur,” Kaldur said, meeting and holding my eyes. Just as our mother had taught us. He reached out to clasp my shoulder, turning me so I faced him. “And when your—when Gemma feels better, I will make my apology to her as well.”

“But will you actually mean it?” I couldn’t help but wonder. “I don’t think you regret what you said. I think you regret when you said it. I don’t want you to give her false apologies. I’d rather you just leave. I’d rather that you return to Vyaan before she wakes.”

Kaldur’s jaw tightened. His hand fell away from my shoulder and he went quiet. He leaned his forearms along the banister, mulling over his thoughts as a tense silence stretched between us.

“She didn’t know, did she?” Kaldur asked, after I’d watched two fishing boats disappear around the cliff bend and counted the waves crashing into the walls below.

A dagger of unease slid between the bones of my chest.

“No,” I answered. “She didn’t.”

“You told her everything last night, didn’t you?” he asked. “Because of what I’d said? Is that why you’re standing under her window like a sentinel?”

A sharp breath made my shoulders slump. I didn’t have it in me to hold a grudge against my brother when it was me that had dragged out the truth for too long. Shortly into our marriage, I’d suspected that Gemma hadn’t known anything about her father’s actions. Yet I’d kept her in the dark purposefully.

Why?

Because I’d begun to fear the repercussions of the truth?

“It’s raw for me, Azur. It’s raw for all of us. Even though it’s been seventeen years, it’s this…this dark tragedy and mystery that’s hung over us nearly all our lives. We’ve only just learned the truth, and it’s stirred up memories that I would rather forget,” Kaldur said quietly. “It broke our mother’s heart. She died fearing she would never be reunited with Aina again, and I still feel her sorrow. I can still feel it, even now. And I took it out on Gemma last night because it gutted me to hear you call her Mother’s title, knowing what her blood did to ours.”

Kaldur’s grief and anger was justified. All of ours was.

“Would you have felt any differently,” I started quietly, “if one of the soldiers had lifted their plasma gun from their holster instead of Rye Hara?”

Kaldur stilled. “What?”

“There were others involved,” I said, the words twisting my gut, “but we’ve only set our sights on the male who did the actual killing. Not the ones who sliced her wings and pinned her down, holding her steady for that piercing shot. Because they killed her too. They might not have pulled the trigger, but they all killed her. And even knowing that…I wonder if we are pursuing the wrong enemies. I wonder if we should be hunting down someone else entirely.”

There was something that Gemma had whispered last night, after the video had cut out and tears had streaked her face, that had made for a restless sleep.

Why?

That word had hummed through my body late in the night, into the early hours of morning when I’d reached for my wife, only to find her absent beside me.

Why?

Why had a human unit of soldiers targeted a peace ambassador after the Voperian victory had already been claimed? It had been an intentional assassination. And I’d been too blinded by my hatred for Rye Hara to take a step back, to see what would’ve been gained from Aina’s death.

We should be seeking out the one who gave Rye Hara the order for her death.

“What do you mean?” Kaldur asked, narrowing his gaze on me.

“They were soldiers,” I told him. “And what do soldiers do in a war?”

Kaldur’s jaw tightened, but I saw a flicker of understanding.

“They carry out orders,” he answered gruffly. “I don’t care. They still made her suffer.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “They did.”

“They never turned themselves in to War Crimes,” Kaldur added. “What they did was immoral, hateful, and illegal. On every level. If they’d had any honor, they would have turned down the orders and reported their superior to the High Quadrant Council. But they didn’t. They acted like mercenaries, hunting down someone for profit, when the war was already over.”

“You’re right,” I told him. “I know you’re right.”

Kaldur was breathing hard, but I watched him take a concerted effort to calm down.

“But I just don’t see it in black and white anymore. I don’t see it carved in stone,” I informed my younger brother. “I can’t. I can’t hate Rye Hara with everything I have in me if I’m falling in love with his daughter.”

Kaldur’s wings snapped. He looked at me with surprise.

“And you can hate me for that if you want,” I added. “You can hate me for choosing her. You can hate me for bringing her here. You can hate me for breaking my vow. You have every right to.”

Kaldur ran a hand down his tired face. “I could never hate you, brother,” he said, shaking his head, his shoulders sinking, his eyes closing. “Don’t ask me to.”

“Kyzaire,” came Zaale’s urgent voice, yelled from the entrance doors.

My chest lurched, and I swung to face him. “What is it?” I asked. “Is Gemma awake?”

“Yes,” Zaale replied, his wings propelling him forward quickly. His eyes were troubled, however. “But Azur…she’s requesting passage on a ship to journey off planet. As soon as possible.”

“What?” I rasped, feeling like I’d just been rammed in the gut.

Zaale’s features were grim when he told me, “The Kylaira demands to return to the Collis.”

Chapter 42

Gemma

Azur burst into my room, nearly shattering the balcony doors, which I had expected the moment Zaale had left. I had expected a dramatic—and sudden—appearance.

“No,” Azur growled, fire burning in those eyes, snatching a dress clean out of Ludayn’s hands—one of my older hideous ones, as he liked to call them—when she tried to pack it into my trunk. “Absolutely not!”

“I’m not asking,” I informed him, feeling my heart twist at the sight of him.

I felt like an open wound right now. A sore, open, oozing wound.

My throat was raw from crying. I had no tears left. My skin felt tight across my bones, and there was a heaviness in my heart that just wouldn’t leave. There was an ache in my body like I’d just climbed up a mountain. I felt hungry and thirsty, and yet I couldn’t bring it in me to eat or drink.

And I was so damn tired even though I’d just slept a full day.

Even still, I felt determination rising through me. I’d woken mere moments before, and I’d known, deep in my soul, what I had to do.

I wouldn’t let Azur dissuade me.

He wouldn’t succeed.

Kalia came through the hallway door just then, nearly skidding across the floor with her speed. “What’s going on? Zaale just said…”

A heavy thud landed on the balcony. When I looked beyond the doors, I saw Kaldur. I met his silver eyes before I looked back to my husband.

I wasn’t even certain if I should call him that anymore. The marriage had likely been the most tortuous thing he’d ever had to do, and I didn’t want…I didn’t want him to suffer for it anymore.

The thought hurt, twisting and aching, until it left me breathless.

“I said no,” he growled, stalking toward me.

“And I told you,” I said, infinitely patient, “I’m not asking. I want you to help me. I want you to get me passage to the Collis or at least to the nearest colony port that—”

“Oh, you think I’d drop off my wife at one of those crowded cesspools of—”

“Then give me a ship,” I said simply, meeting his eyes. “But I want to leave tonight.”

Kaldur was watching the exchange, arms crossed over his wide chest, frowning. Kalia too, but she was nibbling on her bottom lip with her fangs, uncertain if she should step in.

“Why?” Azur rasped.

That was when I saw it.

The panic he was hiding behind the wall of his anger. His vulnerability.

Was he worried that I’d run back to my father, knowing what I knew now? Was he worried I was choosing my father?

No, it couldn’t be. Azur knew me better than that.

“I need to hear it,” I told him softly, wanting him to understand. “I need to hear the truth right from my father’s mouth. I need to hear what he did. And I need to know why. I need the answers. Your family deserves them too.”

Kalia gasped.

I swallowed, feeling my dry eyes begin to burn when I’d thought I had no tears left.

“And he will tell me,” I promised. “He’ll tell me where they buried Aina’s body. I’ll find out where she is, try to bring her back to you, back to Krynn. So her place in your family’s shrine will not lie empty. And maybe…just maybe her soul will find its way back to you.”

Azur’s lips parted. Even Kaldur straightened.

“It’s the least I can do,” I told him, told them all. “The very least after what he’s done. And then I’ll ask him to turn in himself and his unit to War Crimes at the High Quadrant Council.”

“Gemma,” Azur began, shaking his head.

“And if he refuses,” I whispered, meeting those ember eyes, watching his pupils dilate, “then I will turn him in myself.”

All the air in the room seemed to have stilled. It went so quiet that I thought I could hear his heartbeat, thunderous in his chest.

“I’ll need a copy of the video,” I informed him, “before I leave. If it comes down to that.”

Which it might, I couldn’t help but admit silently to myself. My father had lived with this secret for seventeen years, after all.

“You’re not going alone,” Azur growled. “I forbid it.”

“I need to,” I told him. “I don’t want you to come. This is something I need to do on my own. This…”

I took in a deep breath when my voice broke.

“I know he has his faults,” I said. I laughed, and it sounded hollow and broken as I looked at Azur, standing much too far away and yet too close. “Trust me, I know. But I still love him. I cannot turn that off, and I’ve tried before. He’s my father. He’s the man who cried when I broke my arm and who made me special cakes every birthday even though he couldn’t navigate a kitchen to save his life. Who stayed up late every night so my mother could sleep when Mira was born. Who took me hiking through the forests of the Collis when it rained because he knew I loved the smell.”

A sob broke from my throat, and I was too sad and heartbroken to be embarrassed that there were witnesses beyond Azur.

“That man is my father. The one I love,” I told him. “The monster you showed me in the video is not. He’s not the man that I recognize. But I realize that he can be both. I realize he can love me and my sisters and my mother…and then destroy us too. Racking up debts left and right until we had no way to pay them, dismissing my mother’s depression as something she could control, and murdering Aina in cold blood. He didn’t only destroy us, he destroyed so many others too.”

I couldn’t help but wonder if my mother had known. There had been a shift in their relationship. Perhaps not obvious to me at the time, but looking back, things had been different after Pe’ji. She’d stopped dancing with him. Her smiles hadn’t come as naturally. He’d started drinking more. She had too.

Maybe they’d both been miserable, forced to keep a dark secret or else it would destroy our entire family. Their children. Our futures.

Silver tears were running down Kalia’s face. Kaldur had stepped forward, a deep frown of what I thought was understanding on his features.

But it was Azur who captured and claimed my gaze in the end.

I took in a deep breath. I was already dressed. Ludayn had been helping me pack my clothes. I’d come to Krynn with three trunks of everything I’d owned, but I’d be leaving with only one.

Wiping my hand across my cheek, I waited until my tears stopped and then I said, “I need to go alone. I know you understand.”

“Your father isn’t in the Collis,” Azur informed me, his tone careful.

Another sharp pain darted through my heart. So he’d been keeping tabs on Rye Hara. Of course he would. Knowing what I knew now, I knew that Azur must’ve been watching closely, tracking him, like a predator with its prey.

“Where is he?”

Azur’s nostrils flared. His jaw unclenched before he answered, “On Jrika.”

A well-known gambling colony, though its reputation had always been dark. It attracted the worst kind of criminals because its corruption ran deep.

“Has he borrowed any credits?” I asked, another crack splitting down my heart. I’d suspected it, though, hadn’t I? When my sisters had told me he was off planet. He never went off planet unless he was looking for another collector…or he wanted to drink his weight in whiskey and didn’t want his daughters to see.

A rough sound came from Azur’s throat. He stepped toward me. Could he see the despair on my face? Hear it in my voice?

“He tried,” he told me. “On Vrano. I had a friend, Setlan, stop the deal and warn the collector away. And warn your father. He hasn’t tried again, as far as I know.”

“Vaan,” Kaldur cursed quietly, running a hand down his face.

Taking in a deep breath, I pushed away the ache. The hurt. The fury and frustration. “He’ll return if I ask him to. I’ll call him from the ship.”

Azur shook his head. “Gemma, I don’t want you leaving. Especially without protection. You’re not leaving this planet without me and—”

“You need to be here,” I argued. “The harvest just ended. There’s still so many people traveling within Laras and—”

“Fuck the harvest,” he growled. “I don’t want to be without my kyrana.”

Blood.

Of course.

“I can…I can store some of my blood here for you, can’t I?” I asked, frowning. Looking to Ludayn, I asked, “How is it usually done? In containers of some kind? Will I need—”

Azur barked out a harsh laugh. “You think I don’t want to be without your blood, wife? I don’t want to be without you.”

All the breath whistled from my throat when I whirled back to face Azur.

“My maddening, stubborn, frustrating, wonderful little human wife,” he finished, his voice a dark deep rumble. “Today has already been hell without you.”

My lips parted. My throat went tight.

I wanted to fall into his arms. I wanted to bury my face into his chest, feel his wings wrap around me, and let the world fall away. I wanted that so much that it shredded me.

The imprint of the glow of the plasma gun reared through my mind, making me flinch. Making my eyes lower.

“Some distance will be good for us, Azur,” I said instead, stepping away. “To decide if this is what is right. For your family. For your duty. To decide if this…if this marriage is what’s best for everyone involved.”

That flurry of panic darted across his face. “What are you talking about?” he asked, his hand tilting my chin up.

“There’s still so much pain,” I murmured, my eyes briefly flickering to Kaldur, remembering his words last night. “I never knew how much. Not until now.”

“You’re my wife,” Azur growled, his wings lifting to shield away the rest of the room. Until it was just me and him. In the circle of his body.

“I don’t feel like it,” I told him honestly, the words falling like stones from my lips, tears blurring my vision again. And I was so damn tired of crying. “Our marriage only happened because my father killed Aina. It began because of grief and sorrow and vengeance and hatred. It feels wrong. All wrong.”

Azur looked like I’d struck him.

“Please,” I whispered. “Please. Let me see this right first, as best as I’m able to. I’ll find Aina for you. She can return to Krynn, where she belongs. Her soul can cross into Alara. Let me deal with my father. Then we can talk about us.”

I didn’t have the capacity for anything else right now. I needed to focus on one thing at a time.

It took everything in me not to break down right there in his arms. With his heat against me, his scent filling my nostrils. It would be so easy. He would take care of me, I knew it. He would protect me.

But I would never forgive myself if I didn’t do this.

I wouldn’t hide from this, no matter how much I wanted to curl into a ball and stay in his arms.

“Please, Azur,” I said, my voice breaking.

It took everything in him.

I saw it. Every tight muscle. Every fractured facet in his reddened gaze.

When he said, “I’ll have a ship outfitted for you and get a crew on board. You can leave within the hour,” that was when I knew…

That last little piece shifting into place…

I loved him.

And I didn’t know if we could ever be together again.

Chapter 43

Gemma

Our estate in the Collis was just how I’d left it.

Dingy, rusted gate on poorly oiled hinges.

The too-bright green grass that never grew, leading to the circular drive, which wrapped around our crumbling fountain that no longer worked.

Beyond, the grand home stood. It looked small compared to House Kaalium’s keep, and I’d forgotten how quiet it was here. In New Inverness, where I’d lived as a child, little chittering bugs had filled the evenings with their music, especially since we’d lived out in the countryside of the colony planet.

But here…it was silent. Like nothing dared to breathe. Or maybe it was just me.

My father would be here. I’d called him from the ship that Azur had chartered for me, telling him I was returning to the Collis but dodging his questions about why. My sisters had been excited to see me, surprise evident on their faces, especially when I couldn’t quite share their enthusiasm, only offering them half smiles that hadn’t quite reached my eyes.

I was sick to my stomach. A weight of dread lodged deep in the pit of my belly. The cowardly part of me would’ve given anything to flee the Collis. The moment the transport vessel had dropped me off at the gates from port, I’d had the urge to turn and run. To hide in the blue salt mines and just sink into the mountain. A mountain that had been named after my father, which was enough to propel me forward through the gates.

I couldn’t run from this. I would never forgive myself if I tried, just as I knew I would never forgive myself for what I was about to do to my father. My sisters. This would ruin their chances for a future. They’d be shunned from our society, cast out to the wolves. Our estate would be sold. Mother’s grave would be forgotten.

It was Piper that I saw first. Running from the house to me. The last time we’d seen one another in person, she hadn’t quite been able to look me in the eyes, her harsh, biting words still stinging between us. But it was her arms that wrapped around me first, hugging me tight.

“I’ve missed you, Gem,” she whispered in my hair. We were the same height, and I found it so odd since I was used to being around Kylorr. Around Azur with his towering bulk. “We’ve missed you. Please tell me you’ve come home. Please tell me he’s let you come back to us.”

I saw Mira racing from the house too. It was evening, the golden light spilling from the inside like a beacon, and I felt out of place. I didn’t belong here anymore even in my sister’s arms. It was a bewildering, dizzying realization, and all I could think, shamefully enough, was that I wished I was in Azur’s arms right now.

Mira joined us when she reached us, her breath huffing, her delighted laugh filling the small circle.

“I’ve missed you both so much,” I whispered raggedly.

How would I tell them? How could I?

But I was done lying to them. They deserved to know the truth.

Piper and Mira pulled back. It was Mira’s laugh that died first. “What’s wrong, Gem? Tell us.”

The words were stuck in my throat, however. They wouldn’t come out. Not right now.

“Is it him?” Piper asked, her defenses rising. “Did he do something to you?”

“No,” I said, shaking my head, reaching out to squeeze her hand. My other was still wrapped around the handle of my trunk. “No.”

“But you’ve come back?” Mira asked hopefully. “You’ll stay?”

Mira’s lovely face looked so much like mother’s that I wondered if it hurt our father to look at her. Sun-kissed skin, golden hair, and glittering eyes. Piper had her features too but had taken her coloring from our father, like me.

I wondered if looking at me hurt Azur. Because I wondered if I reminded him too much of Rye Hara.

I wanted him.

I wanted him so much that it hurt, but how could we ever move beyond this?

“I’m not sure,” I told them, uncertain what else to say. “But I’m here now. And…And I need to speak with Father. Then I’ll tell you everything.”

Piper frowned, her brows pulling. She was observant, her eyes flicking around my face, scanning the lines of my clothes. I was wearing pants and a soft tunic that flowed over my hips. Estee had made them for me, and I found them infinitely more comfortable than my dresses.

There was a hole in Mira’s dress, I noticed. My eyes stuck to it because it was so unexpected, near where her hand brushed her side, and I wondered if they’d been hiding things from me, too, during our Halo calls.

“Where’s Fran?” I asked.

“In the house,” Piper said, still trying to read me.

I nodded, relieved. Fran hadn’t been present for any calls in the last week. I’d almost worried that she’d been let go, if there were holes in Mira’s dresses and a tight look in Piper’s eyes that hadn’t been there before.

“Come,” I said. “Let’s go inside.”

When we turned, there was a figure standing in the doorway to the house. A burst of adrenaline and dread and sorrow and grief and anger pulsed through me, freezing my lungs and stilling my heart before it beat so fiercely I wondered if Azur could hear it all the way on Krynn.

Father.

Leaning against the doorway, a familiar glittering glass clasped in his hands and a pink hue in his cheeks.

His grin was wide. He was happy to see me. I even saw tears gleaming before he blinked them away.

He embraced me when I reached him, and I smelled the whiskey on his skin, deep in his pores. My stomach roiled but I had the insane urge to hug him tight, to breathe him in.

“This is cause for celebration,” he told me when we pulled away, his arm looping through mine and pulling me into the house.

The first thing I noticed was that some furniture was gone. Disappeared, the dusty edges still noticeable from where they’d been sitting for years. A marble cabinet; a golden curio display we’d had in the main foyer; an entrance table that had once held a Voperian vase, etched in silver, and a bright display of flowers from town.

When I peeked into the front sitting room, the chaise lounge was gone. As was the rug, a tapestry that had been threaded with gold, and a sword that had been hanging on the wall, its handle encrusted with gems.

They’ve been selling furniture, I realized, turning to meet my sisters’ eyes, who cast theirs away.

How bad had it been? How much had they been hiding from me?

Now I knew the burn of hurt at being kept in the dark. And I’d done it to them for so many years.

I had 200 vron sitting in a private account. Azur’s money, a stipulation in our marriage contract. I had asked for it with my sisters in mind, but I hadn’t wanted Father to know about the lump of credits, more credits than we’d seen in years.

“No,” I said quickly, pulling away from his arm. I couldn’t do this anymore. I couldn’t pretend. As much as I wanted to put this off another day, I wouldn’t allow myself to. Aina had waited long enough. Azur, Kalia, his brothers had waited long enough. His mother. “We need to talk, Father. We need to talk now.”

He frowned. I watched his eyes dart, as if he were cataloguing all his wrongdoings since I’d left, already thinking up excuses for why he’d been on Vrano or Jrika. When what I wanted to talk about was much, much worse.

“What about?” Mira asked.

And as much as I hated to do it, I knew this was a conversation that only needed to be between Father and me. I wouldn’t keep the truth from my sisters. I would tell them immediately afterward.

But they didn’t need to witness this.

“I’ll tell you,” I promised. “Later tonight. But this cannot wait.”

Whatever Piper had heard in my voice, it was enough for her to pull Mira away. “Fran is making your favorite stew,” she told me. The words nearly broke my heart. “We’ll go help her in the kitchen while you two speak.”

I nodded, unable to tell her that I hadn’t had an appetite for days.

Then I followed Father into his office, tracing the familiar path after I set my trunk down by the door, every step closer hardening my heart, my sweaty palm clenched around the Halo orb as I stared at Rye Hara’s back. The way he stumbled a little as he took another swig of his whiskey and all I wanted to do was cry.

“What is this about?” he asked when we were safely tucked away in his office. Far from the kitchens. Far from my sisters.

I’d rehearsed on the ship. I’d rehearsed every single word that I would say to him, how I would bring it up, how I would ask him to turn himself in to War Crimes, how I would plead with him to let House Kaalium know where Aina had been buried. If she’d been buried.

But all that went out the window when I felt my throat burn.

There were no words for this.

And so, as my father turned his back to me to head to his glittering bar cart still perched in the corner—something that hadn’t been sold yet—and I heard the familiar clinking of his decanter and the swish of alcohol pouring into glass, I tossed the Halo orb into the air so it floated between us.

Then I played the black feed that Azur had given me access to. With the sound.

“He alerted her Nu device. She’ll come out soon,” came Rye Hara’s voice, the sound warbled with time. The black feed angle hadn’t been in the best place, an outdated model no doubt, which was why it had likely gone unnoticed by my father and his unit, who had taken out all the other cameras and scanned for others in the vicinity. “When she does, cut her wings so she can’t fly. Cut them quickly. She’s strong.”

The decanter clattered on the bar cart, toppling over on the glass. The confusion on my father’s face was evident when he turned to me, but when he saw the black feed, projected into the air between us, I watched his face through the pixels. I watched his face pale, becoming sickly. The whiskey glass in his hand shattered across the floor, but he didn’t even seem to notice when his footsteps crunched over it.

I watched him through the pixels as Aina appeared. His face crumbled when the first, piercing cry left her throat, as she was swarmed at her door in the deep, deep night, on the outer borders of Pe’ji. Her bellowing cry as a blade tore through membranes and tendons and muscles of her wings made my father’s hand clutch the edge of his desk.

“Get her down!” Rye Hara ordered, his voice a growl of an order. “Get her down now!”

Through the black feed, his eyes came to mine.

I waited until the horrific killing was ended, flinching when the sizzle of his plasma gun burst, giving way to silence before a member of his unit laughed, huffing his exertion.

The feed ended. The pixels collapsed like a glittering rain until the Halo stopped the recording.

The silence was deafening. My heart was breaking all over again, nausea swishing back and forth in my belly, like the waves crashing against the cliffs of the keep.

My voice sounded hollow, “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Father.”