Adrian’s chin jerks up. “I haven’t lied to you.”

“No?”

“No,” he asserts. “You want answers? I’ll give you answers. I’ll give you the truth.”

I stop short, wondering why I can suddenly smell vanilla. I shake it away. That’s my imagination. My heart talking, not my head.

Focus, June. Things are hanging in the balance here. Very, very important things.

“Okay,” I say, crossing my arms over my chest. “Let’s start with why you’ve been frequenting prostitution rings for years on end.”

Geneva claps a hand to her mouth to stifle a gasp. “P-prostitution rings?” she stammers.

But Adrian doesn’t so much as glance her way. “I know it looks bad,” he says. “But I wasn’t there for what you think.”

“The floor is yours,” I say scathingly. “We’re all fucking ears.”

“I was searching for someone,” he says fervently. “I was searching for… for my mother.”

That much at least lines up with what Kolya told me. The lie blending right into the truth, so far completely indistinguishable. But it just feels wrong. There’s something missing. Something vital.

Adrian can read the skepticism on my face, because he inches closer, puppy dog eyes in full effect. “It’s the truth, June,” he says desperately. “I knew there was more to her leaving than they were telling me, but no matter how much I asked Kolya, he refused to be honest with me. Then one night, shortly after Kolya killed our father, one of his closest Vors came by the mansion.”

Sara and her father. I find myself holding my breath.

“Kolya dismissed me, but I stayed by the door. I listened. And that was the night I got confirmation that my mother didn’t actually abandon me. She was sold into fucking sex slavery. And since then, I made it my mission to find her. I had to go down into the ring, June. It was the only way.”

My heart beats unevenly. It’d be so easy to fall into his story. I could wrap myself up in those sweet lies like a cozy blanket.

Even as that urge pulls at my heartstrings, though, I’m aware on another level of how badly I want to believe him. Then at least I won’t have to look my daughter in the eye one day and have to explain what her father was like. What he did. And to whom.

“You actually found her.”

He nods. “Yes, I found her. A few years ago.”

“But you kept coming and going. Why didn’t you just break her out of the place the moment you knew where she was?”

His eyes betray some surprise. Clearly, I know more than he anticipated. “Because it’s not so easy to steal a prostitute from right under the nose of her owners, June. I had to be smart. I had to make them think that I was… well, using her. Then, when they least expected it, I got her out of there.”

So far at least, his story hasn’t diverged from Kolya’s reports.