SERAPHINA’S POV
My chest constricted so violently that I had to grip the edge of the mattress to remain upright, the room tilting around me with equal force.
No.
No.
I leaned closer to the screen, as if narrowing the distance might somehow undo what I was witnessing, as though proximity could fracture certainty.
But it didn’t.
My father had known the truth.
He had seen the footage. He had watched the proof that I hadn’t engineered that night, that the narrative forced onto me was incomplete at best and a deliberate lie at worst.
And instead of defending me, instead of confronting the lie…
He had purchased it.
He had buried it. Locked it away behind permissions and suppression codes.
He had watched me endure whispers and accusations, watched me shrink bene
