“You don’t want to hear the truth?” she asked. “You, who abhor lies, don’t want to admit you’ve been trapped in one all your life?”
“For all I know, you’re saying this simply to break up Cole and me, as planned, thinking there’s no way he’d want to date the daughter of his mother’s executioner.”
I’m grasping again.
Her lashes lowered, as if she couldn’t force herself to look at me right now—couldn’t deal with seeing her reflection in my eyes. “I saw how he was with you tonight. He knows, or at least he suspects, but still he’s protective of you. Actually, he’s more than that. He’s adoring.” A beat of surprised silence. “I never really knew him at all, did I? He was never going to leave you. My ace never mattered.”
A tremor nearly rocked me to my butt. “What makes you so sure Helen is...that I could possibly be...?”
“Erin and Helen didn’t just work together. They lived together. Two single women with daughters about the same age. I remember playing trucks with Sami. We’d fill them with dirt and crash them. Sami was blonde, beautiful...with unforgettable eyes. Your eyes. But she was always sad, rarely smiled. Never laughed. We used to make up stories about our dads.”
A lump rose in my throat, and I swallowed hard.
“Erin and Helen used to talk about them. Erin would tell horror stories about the abusive Todd, while Helen would wax poetic about the one that got away. Phillip.”
Phillip.
Phillip Bell.
My father.
I sank to the ground before I could fall. I shook my head. “I would remember.” In more than just my dreams.
Veronica took no pity on me. “I have pictures of the two of us. Helen thought she destroyed everything we owned, but she didn’t.”
No way to prove it’s me in those pictures.
But if Helen really had staged Sami’s death and given the girl to her father, bits and pieces of my past would make sense. How my dad had prowled through our house every night, a gun in hand. I’d assumed he was watching for monsters, even though the gun wouldn’t have hurt them, but maybe he’d been watching for people. Those who might be coming after his little girl.
Rebuttal: he hadn’t known about Anima, slayers and zombies, and Helen would have told him, would have wanted him informed.
Of course, she could have told him, and he could have refused to believe.
And why had she gone back to Anima? Why not leave, as planned? Why turn on Erin?
Only one answer made any sense, and it was the glue that held the entire sordid story together. To protect the daughter she loved.
To protect...me?
Part of me wanted to accept it. To bask in the knowledge that my mother was out there, helping me. The other part still screamed in denial.
“Show me the pictures,” I said.
Veronica nodded. “While we were out fighting, Jules put them in your room for Cole to find. She wants the two of you broken up for good, so he and I can get back together.” Bitterness blended with self-deprecation. “She doesn’t realize it’s never going to happen, but then, she loves him. He saved her life, you know, after Todd purposely burned her and left her for dead. Because yes, he is our dad, and when Erin decided she didn’t want us, he had legal rights to us. He still has them over Jules. He’s the reason we’re off grid.”
The hatch to the tunnel flew open, and something fell through. Heart racing, I wiped my face.
The “something” moaned.
I rushed over...and breathed a sigh of relief when I realized it wasn’t Cole, Frosty or River. It was one of Anima’s best assassins. The guy who’d once shot and killed an innocent man in front of me.
The guy who’d tried to kill me.
Instinctively, I palmed a dagger. He was unconscious, or at least, he was pretending to be. He was wily, this one, and couldn’t be trusted.
River dropped inside, landing and straightening in one fluid motion. He pressed a booted foot into the guy’s neck, grinning over at me. “I win.”
Cole came in next and looked me over. “Everything okay?”
His first concern was for me, always for me. I wanted to cry. No, I wanted to hug him and never let go.
Could lose him over this... “Everyone survived,” I managed to say.
His narrowed gaze leveled on Veronica. “If you said something to hurt her, Ronnie, I—” A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Veronica. If you said something to hurt her, I will—”
“It’s not what you’re thinking,” I interrupted, taking hope in the fact that he’d stopped calling her Ronnie, just because I’d once mentioned how much it bothered me. “We’ll talk about it when we’re alone.” Or never. I voted for never.
He looked from me to Veronica, Veronica to me. Comprehension dawned, and he stiffened. “Helen.”
Sometimes smart boys were a pain.
I bit the side of my tongue, nodded.
Cole turned away, and my heartbeat finally slowed, the organ withering in my chest.
“You should have seen us,” River said, unaware—or uncaring—of the sudden tension in the air. “Guy was fast, but not fast enough. We were able to introduce him to our fists.”