Chapter 6.

The drive to the hospital took eleven minutes. It felt like eleven hours.

Mia sat rigid in the back of Damian’s car, still in the green gown, her mind cycling through every version of deliberate that could apply to her father. An attack. A threat carried out. Something tied to the debt Damian had cleared — had he cleared all of it, or had someone been left unpaid, someone with less patience than Cross Enterprises’ legal department?

“Breathe,” Damian said quietly beside her. It was the first thing either of them had said since leaving the gala.

Don’t tell me to breathe. You don’t know what this could be.”

“You’re right. I don’t.” His voice was steady, but his hand found hers on the seat between them — not soft, exactly, but solid, like an anchor she hadn’t asked for and couldn’t afford to refuse. “But panicking before we have information won’t help him.”

She didn’t pull her hand away. She told herself it didn’t mean anything.

The hospital lobby smelled like antiseptic and fear. A nurse directed them to a private waiting area, where a doctor met them within minutes — Damian’s name, Mia noted distantly, opened doors faster than her own ever had.

“Mr. Bennett is stable,” the doctor said, and the relief that flooded through Mia was so sudden it nearly buckled her knees. “He suffered a head injury and some bruised ribs. Someone found him in the parking structure near his apartment. Security footage shows two men — we’ve already contacted the police.”

“Do we know why?” Damian’s voice had gone hard, businesslike, the same tone Mia imagined he used when a deal was collapsing.

“Your father wasn’t forthcoming with details,” the doctor said, glancing at Mia. “But he did say something before he lost consciousness. He said, ‘Tell them I paid what I owed.’ We assumed it was about his medical bills, but given the police interest, it may mean something else.”

Mia’s stomach dropped.

Tell them I paid what I owed.

Not to Damian. Damian’s debt had been settled six days ago, cleanly, with a signature and a marriage. This was a different debt. A different creditor.

“I need to see him,” Mia said.

She was allowed in alone. Her father lay in the hospital bed, a bandage wrapped around his head, one eye swollen nearly shut, looking smaller than she’d ever seen him — smaller than the day the fraud charges first surfaced, smaller than the night he told her about Damian’s offer.

“Dad.” She took the chair beside the bed, gripping his hand like it might ground her. “What happened? Who did this?”

“Mia.” His voice was hoarse, barely above a whisper. “You shouldn’t be here. You should be at the party, playing the part—”

“Forget the party. Who did this to you?”

His eyes closed briefly, and when they opened again, there was something in them she recognized from the night he told her about the debt — shame, deeper than she’d seen from him before. “There were other debts, Mia. Ones I didn’t tell you about. Ones I didn’t tell Damian about, either.”

“What kind of debts?”

“The kind you don’t pay back with money.” He swallowed hard. “Ten years ago, when I took the fall for the fraud at Cross Enterprises — I didn’t do it alone. I had help covering the money’s trail. People who made sure the investigation ended where I wanted it to end, instead of where it should have. Powerful people. People I’ve been paying, one way or another, ever since.”

Mia’s mind raced back to the study — the corkboard, the photographs, the string connecting faces she hadn’t recognized. “Damian has a file. Photos, newspaper clippings — people connected to what happened ten years ago. Do you know who they are?”

Her father’s face went ashen. “You’ve seen it?”

“Some of it. Not all of it.” She leaned closer. “Dad, if Damian already knows about these people, and they’re the ones who did this to you—”

“Then it means the past isn’t staying in the past.” He gripped her hand with more strength than she expected from someone in his condition. “You need to tell Damian everything I just told you. Tonight. Before they come for anyone else.”

“Anyone else meaning who?”

Richard Bennett’s eyes met hers, and the fear in them was unmistakable.

“Meaning you, Mia. If they think hurting me isn’t enough to settle the debt, they’ll come for the person I care about most. And now that you’re married into the Cross family, you’re not just my daughter anymore. You’re a much bigger target than you used to be.”