Chapter 9 — Twenty Years Between Us

“Don’t move,” Vale said.

The command seemed to come from far away.

My mother stood in front of him, his arm across her throat.

I wanted to reach her.

I wanted to ask a hundred questions before anyone took her away again.

Instead, I looked at the gun beneath her chin.

“Let her go.”

Vale’s gaze shifted to me.

“You’re very much alike.”

“Then you know I’m going to keep asking.”

Sebastian pushed himself higher against the wall.

“Adrian. You’ve heard the sirens.”

“So have you.”

“You can put the gun down now.”

Vale pressed it harder beneath my mother’s jaw.

She made a small sound.

I took a step.

“Don’t hurt her.”

He looked at me for a long moment.

Then he smiled.

“You’ve only just got her back. It would be cruel to lose her twice.”

My mother’s eyes closed.

I had thought fear would make me shake.

Instead, everything became painfully clear.

The distance between us.

The guard standing beside the vault.

Sebastian’s gun somewhere beyond the steel doorway.

My backpack at my feet.

None of those things could solve what was happening.

But Vale wanted me frightened enough to obey.

I had already obeyed and opened the vault.

It hadn’t made him stop.

“What happened after the bridge?” I asked.

He frowned.

My mother looked at me.

“Tell me,” I said to her.

“Olivia—”

“Please. I need to hear it from you.”

Vale’s eyes moved between us.

He didn’t interrupt.

Perhaps he wanted to watch.

Perhaps he thought we were using our last minutes badly.

“My door wouldn’t open,” she said. “The car was burning. After Sebastian found you, part of it went over the barrier.”

I remembered water somewhere in the dreams.

I had always thought it was rain.

“His people found me downstream. I was badly burned.”

“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

“Because the people who were supposed to protect us had already told Adrian where we were going.”

Her voice trembled.

“Sebastian moved me out of the hospital under another name. By then, they had announced that I was dead.”

“And you let them.”

“Yes.”

The answer was quiet.

Unqualified.

I looked at the scars she had hidden beneath her sleeves.

“How long?”

“Until I could walk. Until I could speak without help. Until every plan to bring you to me seemed likely to bring him too.”

Vale shifted behind her.

“You should have stayed in the river.”

The guard near the vault looked toward the entrance again.

A muffled shout came from upstairs.

My mother continued.

“Your aunt took you away. I believed that meant you would have a home while we found a way to end this.”

“She died.”

“I know.”

“I went into foster care.”

“I know.”

I wanted to scream.

Instead, I asked the question that had waited twenty years.

“Where were you?”

Her lips parted.

“Close enough to know how badly I was failing you.”

“That’s not where.”

“I moved. Different names. Different places. I came back when I thought it was safe, and I left when someone connected to Adrian started asking questions.”

“You could have told me.”

“Yes.”

Vale tightened his arm.

She struggled for a breath.

“Yes,” she repeated. “I should have found a way.”

Sebastian looked down.

Neither of them tried to tell me loneliness had been a small price.

That made it worse for a moment.

Then, somehow, better.

“How long have you been in this house?”

“Six months.”

“Why?”

“Adrian had started looking again. We had records, but the people willing to act needed more than old documents and a woman they believed was dead.”

Vale glanced at the blinking light.

His expression sharpened.

My mother kept speaking.

“We arranged for the equipment to send to investigators outside Sebastian’s staff. The key was still with you. We didn’t know when he would reach it.”

“So you waited for him to bring me here?”

“No.”

She answered fiercely enough to make Vale jerk her backward.

“We hoped you would give it to us once we could explain. We were preparing to move the material without putting you in this room.”

Sebastian’s voice was rough.

“The attack wasn’t part of anything we arranged.”

I looked at him.

“Neither was leaving me outside.”

“No.”

My mother’s tears fell onto Vale’s sleeve.

“I saw you upstairs. I wanted to wake you and tell you. Then I told myself one more hour wouldn’t matter.”

“It mattered.”

“I know.”

A voice sounded from a speaker above the door.

“Adrian Vale. Put your weapon down.”

Vale spun toward the sound, dragging my mother with him.

The guard near the vault raised his pistol toward the entrance.

“Federal agents are outside the chamber. Keep your hands visible.”

Vale backed toward the desk.

I moved with him without thinking.

“Olivia,” Sebastian said.

I stopped.

Vale looked at the broken camera inside the vault, then at the red light.

“You don’t have anything.”

My mother lifted her head.

“They have the records.”

“Old records.”

“They have the payments to Ethan.”

Vale’s face changed.

“They have what you said about why you came here. And everyone in this room can tell them what you did tonight.”

He struck her with the hand holding the gun.

I cried out.

She stumbled, but his arm kept her upright.

Sebastian pushed away from the wall.

Vale aimed at him.

Then he changed his mind.

The gun turned toward me.

I saw the barrel.

I couldn’t move.

Sebastian hit Vale’s arm as he fired.

The shot went into the ceiling.

My mother drove her elbow backward into Vale’s ribs. His hold loosened.

I seized his wrist with both hands.

The gun was hot against my fingers.

He tried to wrench it free.

I held on.

Sebastian struck his arm again.

The pistol hit the floor.

I kicked it beneath the desk.

“Hands up!”

The guard at the vault dropped his weapon as agents entered through the steel doorway.

Someone pulled me backward.

Someone else forced Vale to the ground.

My mother stumbled toward the wall.

I twisted free of the agent holding my shoulder.

“Don’t touch her.”

“She’s safe,” he said. “We need to see your hands.”

I lifted them.

They were shaking now.

Vale lay facedown with an agent’s knee between his shoulders.

He turned his head toward Sebastian.

“You gave it all away.”

Sebastian leaned against the desk.

“No,” he said. “Evelyn gave it back.”

They pulled Vale to his feet.

His gaze found my mother.

For a moment, I thought he would speak.

An agent moved him toward the door before he could.

Then he was gone.

The chamber felt impossibly quiet.

My mother stood several feet away.

An agent asked whether she was injured.

She answered without looking away from me.

“No.”

Her cheek was reddening.

I could see blood near her lip.

She took one step.

I moved back.

She stopped.

“You were alive,” I whispered.

“Yes.”

“When I cried for you.”

“Yes.”

“When I tried to remember what your hands felt like.”

She covered her mouth.

I hated that she was crying.

I hated that I wanted to comfort her.

“I wrote to you,” she said. “Every year. Letters I never sent.”

“Why tell me that?”

“Because I don’t have an explanation that makes it right. I only have what happened.”

I looked at her hand.

The thumb that had pressed against my wrist.

The familiar way her fingers curled when she was trying not to reach for me.

I crossed the space before I decided whether I had forgiven anything.

Her arms closed around me.

I knew the pressure.

My body recognized her before my anger could object.

“Mom.”

She made a broken sound against my hair.

“I’m here.”

I gripped the back of her dress.

“Don’t say that unless you’re staying.”

“I’m staying.”

Behind us, something scraped against the floor.

I turned.

Sebastian had slid down beside the desk.

His hand fell away from his side.

For one terrible second, his eyes met mine.

Then they closed.