Chapter 5 - THE MOTHER WHO CHOSE TO DISAPPEAR
For several seconds, Tessa couldn't move.
She had spent eleven years imagining what she would say if she could see her mother again.
I missed you.
Why did you leave?
Do you know how hard it was?
But when Evelyn Monroe reached toward her, Tessa stepped backward.
“Don't touch me.”
Evelyn's face crumpled.
“Tessa.”
“No.”
“I can explain.”
“You had eleven years.”
Lily stood between them, crying.
“Tess, please.”
Tessa looked at her sister.
“You knew?”
“Only since yesterday.”
“Then why didn't you call me?”
“Mom said someone was listening.”
Tessa turned back toward Evelyn.
“Who?”
“Victor Sloane.”
The name seemed to poison the air.
Evelyn glanced toward the library entrance.
“We don't have much time.”
Tessa laughed.
“You had eleven years. I think you can spare five minutes.”
Her mother lowered her eyes.
“Your father wasn't the man you thought he was.”
Tessa felt something cold settle in her stomach.
“Our father left.”
“No.”
Evelyn's voice trembled.
“He was killed.”
Lily gasped.
Evelyn continued.
“Your father worked with me at Northstar Freight. When we discovered Project Seventeen, we tried to report it. We thought the investigator assigned to us was honest.”
“He wasn't,” Tessa said.
“No.”
“Who was he?”
Evelyn looked directly at her.
“Victor Sloane.”
Tessa felt the room tilt.
“He was federal?”
“He was. He used his position to protect the people behind the scheme.”
“Then why did you disappear?”
“Because they killed your father. And when I tried to take you girls away, someone threatened to burn down our apartment building with both of you inside.”
Tessa's anger faltered.
Evelyn took a breath.
“A woman from witness protection helped me disappear. She promised she'd arrange protection for you, too. But before that could happen, our contact was murdered.”
“So you abandoned us.”
“I believed staying away was the only way to keep you alive.”
Tessa shook her head.
“You don't get to call that protection without acknowledging what it cost us.”
Evelyn began crying.
“I know.”
“No, you don't. Lily cried herself to sleep for three years. I worked nights before I finished high school. We lost our apartment twice. I signed college forms as her guardian when I was barely old enough to vote.”
Her voice broke.
“You were alive.”
Evelyn covered her face.
Lily reached for Tessa, but she pulled away.
“Where's the ledger?” Tessa asked.
Evelyn looked up.
“What?”
“That's what everyone wants, right? The ledger?”
Her mother went pale.
“How do you know about that?”
“Roman Bellamy.”
Evelyn's expression changed immediately.
“You must stay away from him.”
“Why?”
“Because his father helped create Project Seventeen.”
“His father is dead.”
“That doesn't mean Roman is innocent.”
Tessa folded her arms.
“Then tell me what he's done.”
Evelyn hesitated.
And Tessa understood.
“You don't know.”
“I know what his family is capable of.”
“That's not the same thing.”
Evelyn reached into her coat and produced a small brass key.
“This opens a storage locker at Grand Central. Everything you need is inside.”
Tessa stared at it.
“Why give it to me?”
“Because I can't trust anyone else.”
Tessa didn't take the key.
“That's a terrible reason to suddenly remember you have a daughter.”
Evelyn flinched.
Then a phone rang.
Not hers.
Lily's.
The screen displayed an unknown number.
She answered.
A man's voice came through the speaker.
“Hello, Evelyn.”
Evelyn froze.
The voice continued.
“You've been difficult to find.”
A pause.
“Tell your daughters to look outside.”
Through the library windows, a black sedan rolled slowly to the curb.
And inside sat a man Evelyn had watched die eleven years earlier.
May you like
Her husband.
Tessa's father.
