The text message from her adoptive mother, Lorraine Bishop, was as subtle as a sledgehammer: `Family meeting. Tonight. Don't be late.`
It was a summons, not an invitation.
"I have to go see my family," Jazmin told Iain.
"Interesting," he said, a flicker of curiosity in his eyes. "I'll come with you."
The Bishop residence was a cramped, aging townhouse in a rundown part of Brooklyn. It smelled of stale cigarette smoke and boiled cabbage. It was a world away from the Garretts' Long Island estate or Iain's minimalist Soho penthouse.
When Jazmin opened the door, they were all there, waiting for her like vultures. Her adoptive parents, Lorraine and Mark, and her older adoptive brother, Kevin. The dining table was littered not with food, but with a pile of unpaid bills.
"Well, look what the cat dragged in," Lorraine sneered, her eyes immediately fixing on Iain's expensive wheelchair. "And she brought her new cripple."
"We need money," Mark said, getting straight to the point. "Your divorce has made us a laughingstock in the neighborhood. We deserve compensation for the emotional distress."
Jazmin just looked at them, her expression blank.
Kevin, a man with a weak chin and greedy eyes, slid a crumpled piece of paper across the table. It was a childishly written IOU for twenty dollars, signed by a ten-year-old Jazmin. "You've always been in our debt," he said.
Iain, parked in the corner, watched the pathetic theater with a detached amusement, his fingers tapping a silent, rhythmic beat on the armrest of his chair.
"You ungrateful little tramp," Lorraine spat when Jazmin didn't respond. "We took you in when no one else wanted you. A worthless orphan."
Jazmin's eyes went cold. She stood up and walked to the solid oak dining table. She placed her hands flat on the edge and applied a small amount of pressure.
The wood groaned, then splintered with a loud crack.
Lorraine stumbled back, her eyes wide with fear.
Jazmin reached into her purse and pulled out a check. She slapped it down on the table. The amount was for twenty thousand dollars-the exact sum the state had paid the Bishops for her foster care, calculated down to the last cent.
"This pays for my childhood," she said, her voice flat. "We're even. From this moment on, you and I are strangers."
Mark's hand shot out to grab the check. Jazmin slammed her own hand down on top of his, pinning it to the table. He screamed, a thin, reedy sound.
"If you ever contact me again," she said, her voice dropping to a deadly whisper, "the consequences will be far more permanent than a broken hand."
Kevin puffed out his chest and took a step forward. "You can't threaten us-"
He didn't finish the sentence. Finn, who had been standing silently by the door, moved with blurring speed, grabbing Kevin and slamming him face-first against the wall.
It was then that Iain finally spoke, his voice cutting through the room like a shard of ice.
"Alex," he said, not even looking at the cowering family. "Find every business they own, every loan they have, every contract they've signed. And crush them."
The Bishops' faces dissolved into pure panic. They fell to their knees, begging, pleading, their greed instantly replaced by terror.
Jazmin didn't give them a second glance. She turned Iain's wheelchair and pushed him out of the suffocating house.
Outside, the cool night air felt clean. Jazmin took a deep breath, feeling a chain she didn't even know was there finally break.
Iain looked up at her. For the first time, he saw a crack in her armor, a flicker of old pain.
He reached up and covered her hand on his wheelchair with his own. His skin was cool, but the gesture was strangely comforting.
This time, she didn't pull away.
Back in the car, the silence was thick.
"Why did you bring me?" Iain asked.
"I wanted you to see where I come from," she said. "I wanted you to see what I'm willing to leave behind."
Iain was quiet for a long moment. Then he said, his voice softer than she'd ever heard it, "From now on, you have me."
It was a line. A carefully crafted piece of manipulation from a master. Jazmin knew that. But a small, treacherous part of her, the part that remembered the cold Brooklyn nights, felt a flicker of warmth.
A frantic, flashing red warning filled her vision.
`[WARNING! EMOTIONAL FLUCTUATION DETECTED! CHARACTER LOGIC AT RISK OF DEVIATION! MAINTAIN RATIONALITY!]`
