King of Slaves (Jenna's Story) (The Slave Series Book 5) (39 page)

“Don’t you want to know what Alex wanted? When I saw her, she said that she really needed to talk to you.”

“Yes, of course.” Jenna got up from her chair.

“Just so you know, Jenna, I moved Alex to the neighboring room.”

“Why?”

“There was a problem with her door.”

“What problem?” Jenna asked.

“Something with the lock. It’s nothing.”

Jenna thanked Mr. Tulm for his lesson and couldn’t help notice how Zurry’s foot was tapping impatiently. When she closed the door, she heard him say to his father; “I have something important to tell you.”

She was tempted to lean her head against the door to eavesdrop, but people who did that sort of thing were despicable, so she left to find Alex. 

CHAPTER 34

Veto

Jenna

Jenna paused in front of the broken door to Jenna’s old room.
What the hell happened?
Worry rushed through her –
Was Alex attacked?
Jenna had texted her asking where she was and all she said was “in my room, I’ll wait for you.”

“Alex?” Jenna called out.

Zurry had told her Alex wanted to talk to her and that he had moved her to a neighboring room, so it was either to the left or the right of the broken door.

“Alex?” she called out again, and this time the door to the left opened and Alex popped her head out.

“Good, I was just about to go look for you. What took you so long?”

“What took me so long?” Jenna voice was high-pitched. “Why don’t you start by telling me what happened to the door?” Her left hand was firmly on her hip and her right was pointing accusingly at the broken door. “Did the SWAT team pay you a visit or what?”

Alex grinned. “Sort of, if you can call Zurry a single-person SWAT team.”

More in a high pitch came from Jenna. “Zurry did this?”

“Hey, calm down, he thought I was in danger, okay?”

Jenna changed her balance to her right foot. “Were you in danger? I’m so confused right now… what is going on here?”

Alex took five steps toward Jenna and pulled her by the hand. “Come on, sis, I’ll explain everything.”

Jenna followed Alex into her new room and took a seat on a small loveseat pressed up against the wall.

“I called Dad like we agreed, but we got into a huge argument, and I got so mad at him that I started shouting.”

“Okay…” Jenna nodded to show that she was following so far.

“Yeah, and then, well it was basically just bad timing because Zurry came to talk to me, heard me shouting, and somehow assumed that I was in danger.”

“So he kicked in your door?”

Alex nodded. “Listen, something weird is going on with Dad and I don’t like it. He told me Mom didn’t die from breast cancer and ‘You don’t have to worry.’”

Jenna’s jaw dropped. Her voice sounded deep and dripping with suppressed anger when she spoke in a slow cadence. “Then what
did
Mom die from?“

“He didn’t say, and we got interrupted when Zurry barged in.”

“I’m calling Dad up, right now.”

“No, Jenna. He’s just going to tell us another lie. It’s what he does. We need to see the medical records for ourselves. I told him to bring them.”

“And you think I’ll be able to wait for him to get here? Ha!” Jenna snorted. “Not a chance, and besides – what makes you think he won’t just create false papers if he’s trying to cover up something?”

Jenna pulled out her phone and dialed her father’s number. She was shaking with fury, could feel tears pressing, and her jaw felt tense like it did when she was almost too angry to speak.

Andy didn’t answer his phone, and she didn’t want to leave a voice mail.

“He’s not going to pick up,” Alex said softly and placed her hand on Jenna’s shoulder.

“Yes, he is,” Jenna replied and tried again. And again.

Five times she called up her dad and five times she heard it go to voice mail.

“He doesn’t want to talk to us right now,” Alex pondered out loud.

“No he’s probably busy trying to conjure up a new lie about what killed our mother.” Jenna typed a short text and two minutes later her phone lit up.

“What did you write?” Alex asked surprised.

“I told him to call me or don’t come to my wedding.”

Alex stayed quiet as Jenna answered in a cool voice. “Dad, talk to me… I want to know the truth.”

Alex leaned her head against Jenna’s to hear, and it made Jenna put the phone on speaker.

“Jenna, honey, I’m sorry. I never meant for you to worry about dying young.” He sounded slurred, and Jenna concluded he had been drinking.

“Why did you lie to us?” Her voice broke a little.

“You were so small and innocent, and I didn’t want you to know the truth.”

“We are not little girls any longer, so tell us the truth now.”

There was silence on the line.

“Dad?”

He sighed. “Yes, I’m here.”

“Tell us the goddamn truth or stay out of our lives.”

Alex’s eyes widened when Jenna threw the ultimatum at their dad. 

“What exactly do you want to know?”

“Everything.” Jenna’s voice was shaking. “How did she die, why did you lie, why do Grandma and Granddad say they aren’t allowed to talk to us?”

“Maybe it would be better if we had this conversation when I get there… a phone is really not….”

Jenna interrupted him. “At this point, I’m not even sure I want you at my wedding. Do you have any idea how worried I’ve been because of your stupid lie? You
will
tell us everything
right now
.”

“All right,” he said with resignation and gave a long heavy sigh. “The last year before Emily died was rough on both of us. I never told you this but your mom didn’t come from money, and it was hard for her when my political career really started taking off.”

“What do you mean ‘it was hard for her’?”

“The fancy parties, the attention from the press, and the pressure to look good and cultivated among the finest in Chicago. Now, I don’t want to bash your memory of your mom, but she really was just a beauty queen with nothing going for her besides a nice body and a blinding smile. The dinners and the pressure was getting to her… so she started drinking.”

“Are you saying that Mom died of drinking?”

Another deep sigh. “In a way. We were supposed to host a large fundraising campaign on the day she died and when I came home from a meeting, she had overdosed on booze and pills.”

“What?”

“I would like to tell you it was an accident, but she left a note that confirmed it was suicide.”

Jenna’s voice was shaking. “What did the note say?”

Andy sighed. “It was just one word.”

“What word?”

“The note just said, ‘Sorry!’”

Alex squeezed Jenna’s hand. “And Grandma and Granddad?”

“They were spreading lies and trying to ruin my career. Your mother never liked them, so when she died I wanted them out of my life… I paid them a handsome sum to stay away from us, and they were happy to take the money.”

“What lies?” Alex asked.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Yes, it does. What were they saying?”

He hesitated before he spoke. “That your mother killed herself because I had an affair.”

Jenna took a long deep breath and closed her eyes. She had seen her father use and discard beautiful women all her life. Her mother had been no different from her predecessors, except she had served the purpose of providing Andy with two children that gave him appeal with the family-oriented voters.

“And you couldn’t let the newspapers find out that your young beautiful wife had killed herself because of your infidelity, could you?”

He didn’t answer.

“Dad… did you cheat on Mom?” Alex asked, and Jenna gave her a hard what-do-you-think look and brushed her own angry tears away.

“Of course not,” he said.

“Don’t lie to us,” Jenna threatened. “We will find out, and if you want any chance of being part of our lives, you will tell the truth… I don’t care if the truth is ugly, but I won’t accept any more lies from you.”

“But this is all in the past… I can hardly remember anything.” 

“Did you or did you not, cheat on Mom?” Jenna asked with a razor-sharp tone.

“There was a short affair, but it was nothing.”

“One affair?”

“Well, maybe a few, but I made sure your Mom had everything. She was just a clueless little girl when I met her and I never would have married her if not for…” he trailed of.

“If not for what?”

“If she hadn’t gotten pregnant,” he sighed.

Jenna couldn’t stop her tears from falling.

“So Mom was healthy as a horse, but miserable as hell, is that is?”

“I guess you could say that,” he confirmed.

“How can we ever trust anything you say?”

There was a moment of deep silence before he spoke in a thick voice. “You can trust that I love you.”

“You don’t even know what the word means,” Jenna hissed, pressed “end call,” and threw the phone down on the bed.

For a minute both women sat quietly in their own thoughts. Alex was the first to speak. “I can’t believe Mom killed herself.”

“I don’t know what to say…” Jenna whispered.

“And Grandma and Granddad took the bribe and just left us with the man who indirectly killed their daughter… can you believe that?” Alex got up from the chair and looked around the room. “I feel like smashing something.”

Jenna jerked her head up. “Me too, and I know the perfect place to get our aggression out.”

Ten minutes later Alex and Jenna were in the underground gym, kicking and beating on boxing bags.

It felt like years of built-up frustration was being let out as they lashed out verbally at their father for all the things they resented him for.

“I don’t think he even knows when he’s lying anymore.”

“I hate that he talks about Mom as if she meant nothing to him.”

“He’s such a bastard.”

They kept at it while physically releasing their anger on the boxing bags, and didn’t stop until their arms and legs were burning with pain. Only then did they allow themselves to sit down and catch their breath.

Alex’s hair was wilder than normal, and for once her normally pale skin matched her flaming red hair.

“You look like a tomato.” Jenna grinned. The endorphins from the workout had done wonders for her mood.

“Yeah, well, I feel like a boiled lobster… so hot.”

Jenna got up and handed Alex a bottle of water from a nearby fridge. “I got so distracted by this whole thing with Dad that I didn’t get a chance to ask you: did something happen between you and Zurry? He looked suspiciously happy when I saw him.”

The expression on Alex’s face said it all. Guilt, excitement, joy… it was all there.

“Alex… what did you do? Did you make out with him again?”

Alex broke into a guilty grin. “Don’t be mad at me.”

Jenna rolled her eyes. “But why, Alex? You know he’s a womanizer.”

“That’s what you keep saying, but did you know that he never slept with Cindy… he slept on her couch to protect her from her ex, nothing more.”

“According to him,” Jenna said dryly and leaned her head back to empty her water bottle.

Alex frowned. “I choose to trust him and you’d better find a way to be happy for me, because he’s moving to the US to be with me.”

Jenna, who had her mouth full of water, sprayed it out with force.

Alex pulled back but couldn’t avoid getting most of it on her. “Eww, gross, Jenna.”

“Zurry is moving to Chicago?”

“No, he’s moving to Washington DC as the ambassador for Spirima.”

“I don’t believe it.”

“It was Kioni’s suggestion.”

“What?”

“That’s what Zurry told me.”

Jenna’s eyes narrowed. “I can’t believe he didn’t tell me.”

Alex rushed to calm Jenna. “I’m really happy, and I’ve accepted his proposal.”

“What are you talking about?” Jenna asked in disbelief. “What proposal?”

“Zurry asked me to marry him.”

Jenna had just dealt with her father’s betrayal; now her sister was letting her down too. “Don’t be absurd, you can’t marry Zurry. I veto that decision.”

Alex wrinkled her nose. “I don’t need your permission to marry Zurry. I’m a grown woman.”

“How am I supposed to protect you from getting your heart broken when you make stupid decisions like that, Alex?”