Chapter 5: The Snake in the Garden

Veronica pov

My world was a blur of white, cold, and dark green. Jude's words felt like a heavy blanket that stopped me from breathing. My father. A hitman. A killer. The man who had put his arm around Jude's little sister. The man who had been told to kill her.

I couldn't speak. I just sat in the chair, my hands on my stomach. The baby inside me felt so small, so tiny. I wanted to tell him everything would be okay, but a big, ugly part of me knew it was not true. How could it be okay? My father was a killer, and I was in the house of the man he had hurt.

Jude did not come to me. He stood by the desk, his hands on the old wooden box. His face was still a hard mask, but his eyes were a quiet storm.

"No," I finally said, my voice shaky and small. "You are lying. My father was a good man. He worked at a business. He was kind."

Jude just shook his head. He didn't yell at me. He didn't get mad at me. He just looked at me with a sadness that was so deep, it made my heart hurt.

"He was the best. He was smart. But he was also loyal to my family's enemy. They gave him money. A lot of money. To kill my father. To kill my sister. They wanted to start a war."

He walked to a small file cabinet and opened a drawer. He pulled out a big, brown folder and put it on the desk. He opened it and pushed it toward me.

"Look," he said.

I didn't want to look. I wanted to close my eyes and pretend it was all a bad dream. But I knew I couldn't. I had to know the truth for my baby. I had to be strong.

I stood up and walked to the desk. I looked down at the folder. Inside were papers with my father's name on them. And pictures. Old pictures. Pictures of my father in places I had never seen. Pictures of him with different kinds of men, not like the men he worked with in his office. These men were hard. They had cold eyes.

There was a picture of my father smiling, but it was not a kind smile. It was a killer’s smile. It was not the smile of the father I knew.

I felt a new kind of pain. A pain that was sharp and deep. The man who raised me was not who I thought he was. He was a liar. My whole life was a lie.

I looked up at Jude. He was watching me, his eyes full of that quiet fire.

"Why are you telling me this?" I asked, my voice a whisper. "Why am I here?"

"Because you are a part of this now," he said. "The men who told your father to do it... they are still here. They are a big, powerful family. And they think they won."

He took another picture from the folder and put it on the desk. I looked at it. My breath caught in my throat. It was Rhea. My best friend. My snake in the grass. She was standing in a room with the same kind of men as in the other pictures. She was smiling. A big, happy, fake smile. Her arm was around a tall, older man with a mean face.

"Who is that?" I asked, my voice shaking.

"That," Jude said, "is the man who leads the family that hurt mine. The man who told your father to kill them. And Rhea is his daughter. The snake in your garden was never your friend. She was a spy. She was a plant. She was with you to find a way to get to Jason. Not because she loved him, but because he was a way to get power. A way to get close to the Harpers, to bring them down. You were just a pawn in her game."

A cold, angry feeling started to burn in my chest. It was not sadness. It was on fire. Rhea was not just a mean girl who stole my husband. She was a snake from a family of killers. She had played me. She had made a game out of my life. She had smiled at me and called me "best friend" while she was waiting for a chance to hurt me.

"And Jason?" I asked. "Is he... with them?"

"Jason is a weak man who fell for a pretty face," Jude said, his voice flat. "He didn't know he was playing a game with a lion. But now, he is deep with them. They have him. And they want you back."

My heart pounded. "Why? Why do they want me?"

Jude looked at me, and his eyes dropped to my stomach again. My hand went to my baby. I held it tight, like I could keep him safe just by holding him.

"You have something Jason wants back," he said. "And they want to use it against me. You are still a piece on their board."

"The baby," I whispered. "They know about the baby."

Jude nodded slowly. "Rhea knows everything. She knew you were pregnant. She told her family. She is telling them now. She knows that the baby is a threat to her family. A threat to her father's empire. She is telling them to come after you and the baby."

The safe, quiet room was not safe anymore. It was a ticking bomb. I was not hiding from Jason. I was hiding from a family of killers who wanted me and my baby. My anger turned to fear. A cold, sharp fear that made me want to scream.

The phone on the desk, the new phone Jude had given me, started to make a loud noise. It was a text message. I looked at the phone. It was a number I didn't know. Jude grabbed the phone before I could touch it. He looked at the screen, and his face, which was always a hard rock, went even colder.

"What is it?" I asked, my voice a tiny whisper.

He didn't answer me. He just turned the phone around and showed me the screen. The text message had one thing on it. A picture. A picture of me. I was leaving the bar last night. The picture was fuzzy, but it was me. I was getting into his black car. And under the picture, there were just three words. From Rhea.