"I know this doesn't count for much, but I am sorry Phei, sorry for being exactly the person Harold raised me to be."
The sentence landed in the penthouse like a body hitting the floor.
Because that was it, wasn't it? That was the architecture underneath all of it. Not cruelty for cruelty'ssake. Not some innate Victoria-shapedevil that had been born into her the way amethyst eyes had been born into Phei before he lost them.
She'd been made.
Constructed... he knew that much.
Harold Maxton had taken a girl and built a weapon out of her—taught her that power meant stepping on the people below you, that family meant hierarchy, that love was conditional and always, always had a price tag.
And she'd been his best student.
Better than Danton, who was too stupid to be cruel with precision. Better than Delilah, who'd inherited Melissa's conscience and had to fight it every time she aimed. Better than Sienna, who'd opted out of the game entirely by disappearing into silence.
