Time/Date: TC1853.01.20 – Midday
Location: Long Family Vehicle, En Route to Metropolitan Police Station, 4th Ring
The confession hung in the warded silence.
Kill her.
Darian sat absolutely still, his face a mask of control that revealed nothing of the horror churning beneath. Thirty years of military discipline held him steady when every instinct screamed to recoil from what his daughter—the girl he'd raised, loved, protected—had just admitted.
Caelia's hand had flown to her mouth, genuine shock breaking through her careful composure. For all her manipulation, for all her calculated coldness about family matters, apparently, the confession of attempted murder still had power to horrify her.
Or maybe just the admission that it had been planned was shocking. Maybe the reality had been there all along, hidden behind layers of plausible deniability.
