Divinity Read Online Free

breathy accusation. “You? You are my father?”
    “I am.”
    Julia shook her head and pulled the covers up further, wrapping them tightly around her shoulders as though that would stave off insanity. I have totally lost my mind .
    An even smaller voice sounded in her head, one that shook her to her core. You know it’s true .
    “You have not lost your mind,” Gabriel said, slowly crossing his arms.
    “Then you…what? Had sex with a lunatic?” Julia blurted out, ignoring that Gabriel had somehow read her thoughts. “Why would you choose an insane person?”
    “Child.” Gabriel’s voice was so potent, so powerful and stern. Julia found she was holding her breath, waiting for his answer.
    “The people on this planet are too firmly planted in their ‘reality’ for us to even try to accomplish such a thing with them,” he began. “One referred to as ‘insane’ here, however, usually bears that label because they are open to alternate realities. Your mother was very open. Because of the abuse she suffered as a child, she stopped existing within this ‘reality’ long ago. It was easy to speak with her and for her to openly understand without the mental barriers that others would have. She knew who I was. She knew she would conceive my child.”
    The truth of his words struck Julia like lightning to her spine, both electrifying and immobilizing her. With the knowledge came anger, though. Years of loneliness and suffering that he should have had the power to save her from. Wasn’t that what angels were for?
    “Why didn’t you tell me before? Why wait this long? My whole life has been so… horrific! Why wouldn’t you do something about that? Help me somehow…” Her voice tapered off as the tears took hold, and the reason she had never felt like she belonged hit home.
    “Child,” he repeated, his tone all forced patience, “you needed strength to be able to do what you have been placed here to do. There is no better way to gain strength than to live through adversity such as you did. You were always protected; you have never walked this earth alone.”
    “Adversity?” Julia shouted incredulously. “You mean horror! And how can you even say that I’ve been protected? The abuse, the…everything! I…” Her words choked off into sobbing. There were so many things she had always wanted to say to her father, so many questions, but at that moment she froze, seething and confused. The words all seemed to get lodged in her throat.
    “Protected from death, Child.”
    His calm infuriated her further. Couldn’t he just say he was sorry? She didn’t need rationalizing, she needed a hug. That thought jarred her back into the moment and she shook her head. Really? A hug from this thing? She really had lost it.
    “The other trials were so that you would know strength and compassion, that you would become strength and that you would exude it. You will be grateful for it, for what you must face, and all those whose lives you have touched are better for having felt your compassion. Would you take that from them?”
    He reminded her of a father who had to tell his child the family pet had died. There was sadness in his eyes, deep and dark. But she didn’t care. Was she delusional, or pissed off? Maybe it was both, but if this was her real father, he was going to hear a piece of her mind.
    “How could you just stand by and let your so-called daughter be violated!” Julia spat. “How could you stand by while I suffered? Did you know my ‘family’ threw me out when they found out it was their son who was abusing me? Like I was the one that ruined him? How could you allow such immense emotional damage to happen to me that death was the only solution I saw?”
    She wanted to pound her fists on his chest as she yelled. She wanted to pound her hurt into him. Gabriel’s eyes never left hers, but they were now cold. Not the loving eyes of the father she had always imagined. He didn’t move, rush forward and embrace