---- Chapter 15 Caryl Carlson POV: The slap echoed through the living room. My head snapped to the side, my cheek stinging. "You murderous bitch," Danial snarled, his face a mask of fury. "How dare you!" | shrieked, cradling my cheek. "Brandon will kill you for this!" "Will he?" Danial laughed, a harsh, humorless sound. "| think he'll be more interested to know that you're the one who killed his beloved grandfather." "It was Farah!" | insisted, my voice rising with panic. "Stop lying!" he roared. "| know it was you! | saw the look on your face that day on the stairs!" Just then, the front door opened. Brandon stood on the threshold, his presence filling the room like a storm cloud. His face was pale, his eyes dark and terrifyingly calm. "Brandon!" | cried, rushing to him and trying to hide behind him. "Danial is crazy! He's saying horrible things! He says | killed Grandpa!" Brandon didn't move. He didn't comfort me. He just looked ---- down at me, his gaze cold enough to freeze my blood. "Why, Caryl?" he asked, his voice quiet. Too quiet. "He's been brainwashed by Farah!" | sobbed, pointing a trembling finger at Danial. "She's turned him against me!" | was confident. All the evidence was gone. The doctor was out of the country. No one could prove a thing. "You've been playing this game for a long time, haven't you?" Danial spat, his lip curling in disgust. "Faking blindness, faking amnesia, manipulating my brother." "| don't know what you're talking about!" | cried. "Where's your proof?" "We have a witness, Caryl," Danial said, his eyes glittering with triumph. My heart stopped. A witness? Impossible. | looked at Brandon, my eyes wide with desperation. His expression was unreadable. He was looking at my tears, but for the first time, they had no effect on him. He looked... disgusted. Suddenly, his hand shot out, his fingers wrapping around my throat. He lifted me off my feet, my legs kicking uselessly in the air. "Why?" he repeated, his voice a deadly whisper. "Why did you do it?" ---- "L... don't... know..." | choked out. He threw me to the floor. | landed hard, pain shooting through my body. "| didn't mean to," | gasped, crawling towards him. "It was an accident! | was just angry at Farah!" He looked down at me, his face a mask of cold fury. "The car crash wasn't an accident. Faking your blindness wasn't an accident. Paying off the doctor wasn't an accident. And killing my grandfather..." His voice broke, thick with a pain so profound it was terrifying. "...that was not an accident." He knelt down, his hand clamping over my jaw. With a sudden, brutal twist, he dislocated it. A scream of pure agony was ripped from my throat, but it came out as a muffled, horrifying gurgle. The pain was blinding, excruciating. | writhed on the floor, my body convulsing. "You took everything from me," he said, his voice a low, terrifying growl as he stood over my broken form. "You took my grandfather. You made me destroy the woman I..." He couldn't finish the sentence. He leaned down, his face inches from mine, his eyes burning with a righteous, terrifying fire. "| will make you pay, Caryl. | will make you wish you had never been born."