Page 45 of The Brat: Prequel

I love my sister but holy crap, I could pull out her hair for that insult.

Maxim is nothing like our bastard sperm donor.

“…but he hasn’t shown up, demanding she set a date.”

“It won’t work the same way as your engagement,” Camille reasons, her tone soothing.

For all that Inessa loves Eoghan, and vice versa, everyone knows that her wedding day was traumatic.

That’s what you get for being dragged down the aisle after a beating because you tried to run away, meeting your future husband at the altar, then having said husband figure out that your papa was behind the bruises covering you before proceeding to dislocate his shoulder in the vestry.

Never a quiet day in our family…

“Of course it will! He’ll choose when to pop up in her life. This is a business deal.”

“No, it isn’t. I told him I’d only agree to this if he courted her.”

“Courted her?” Inessa repeats. “Well, why isn’t he doing that?”

“I-I don’t know.” I can hear Camille’s confusion and her anxiety.

She arranged my marriage with Maxim.

I always wondered how the deal came about.

A part of me figured it might be something Aidan Sr. organized…

Apparently not.

The betrayal cuts to the quick. I never suspected Camille would be behind something like this. Not when she, more than any of the Vasov girls, fought for her freedom so ferociously.

Struggling to make sense of this, I rub my temple.

I already knew about the deal. Thank God. It’d have been much worse if I hadn’t known about my arrangement with Maxim and⁠—

Wait.

That’s it.

That’s the betrayal.

I’m honest enough with myself to know there’s no other man for me anyway. Maxim’s mine. But that they kept me in the dark, after all these years of silence when they know I function better with the facts⁠—

“We should prepare her,” Inessa asserts. Hell yeah, you should. “She should know what’s coming for her. She’ll be going to college soon. She’ll want to date!”

“He’ll let her. He’s never stopped her from experimenting with boys,” Camille’s quick to say.

“Oh, yeah, he just cuts off their hands if they push her past her limits. How rational he is,” Inessa sneers. “Anyway, she’s in contact with him, so don’t fool yourself about that.”

“No—”

“Open your eyes, Camille. He has guards on her, yes, but the extent he goes to for her… she has to be communicating with him.”

“Dammit,” Camille whispers. “I didn’t want this for her. I never wanted this for her. I always hoped she’d have the freedom we didn’t have!”

“It’s not your fault.”

“Yes, it is. Who else’s? Nobody’s.” I hear the agony in her voice and wince at it. With my anger waning at the self-flagellation oozing from every word, she rasps, “He only managed to get me to agree because he watched me do it.”