After Our Entire Family Was Reborn Adopted Brother Went Insane Chapter 07
The line went dead.
Ethan set down his phone and pressed a warm mug of milk into my hands.
“Why didn’t you just come out with it?”
I wrapped my fingers around the mug, staring into the middle distance.
“Because I wanted to see.”
“I wanted to see whether, in that house, there was even one person who was thinking clearly.”
“I wanted to see how far Leo – that devoted older brother – would go to cover for Lily.”
Three days passed.
Leo showed up at our door.
He looked haggard – unshaven, hollow-eyed, hollowed out.
Anyone who didn’t know the truth would have thought he’d gone without sleep for days searching for his sister.
Then, abruptly, he dropped to his knees in front of me.
“Summer.
Please.”
“Save Lily.”
I was stunned into silence.
He knew the truth.
He knew exactly what was happening.
What exactly was he asking me to save her from?
“I know I was wrong the other day.
I had no right to hit you, no right to say those things.”
“Blame me.
Beat me.
Do whatever you want to me.”
“But Lily is innocent in all of this.
They’ve given her one day.
If we don’t pay, they’ll kill her.”
I called out to him quietly.
“Leo.”
A flicker of hope lit in his eyes.
“You’ll help her?”
I held his gaze.
“I remember when I first came to the Harringtons.
I was small, and it was summer.”
“I saw other children eating ice cream and I stared so hard I practically left marks on the air.”
“You saved up your breakfast money for a week and bought me the most expensive one they had.”
“You told me I was a Harrington now.
Anything they had, I had.”
Leo’s eyes went red.
“Yes.
I always thought of you as my real sister -“
“If that’s true.”
I shot to my feet, my voice slicing through the room.
“Then why did you lie to me?”
“Why did you lie to Mom and Dad?”
“That night – Lily called you.
I was right there.”
“I heard every word.”
Leo’s face drained of color.
He went rigid.
“You… you heard?”
His voice was barely above a whisper.
“Yes.
I heard everything.”
I crossed the room and crouched down until I was level with his eyes.
“She said she wanted to run away.
She said she had someone she loved.”
“Leo, you knew exactly where she was.
You knew this was a show she put on herself.”
“And yet you came here to trick fifty million out of the Wentworths – to help her elope?
To bankroll her and some man she’d run off with?”
“Is that what it means to treat me like your real sister?”
Leo’s gaze darted away from mine.
His lips trembled.
“No, it’s not like that…”
“Lily, she was just… caught up for a moment.”
“That man is an artist.
He’s talented.
Lily wants to fund his exhibition.
She needs the money.”
“Once he wins something abroad, she’ll come home.
She’ll just be gone for a bit.”
“Summer, please – just help her.
If Mom finds out Lily ran away with someone, her heart won’t be able to take it.”
In that moment.
Something in me went completely cold.
To spare Mom the heartache, Lily could gamble away my marriage and steal fifty million from the Wentworths?
For the sake of Lily’s so-called true love, the entire family could be played for fools?
I raised my hand and slapped Leo hard across the face.
“Leo.
That was for Mom and Dad.”
I stood up and looked at him, my voice flat and final.
“Not a cent.
I won’t give a single penny.”
“And I’ll make sure Mom and Dad see it with their own eyes.”
“See exactly where their precious daughter is – and exactly how well she’s enjoying herself.”
