Guilt savaged me like a wild animal lunging at my throat at the vague memory of my drunken rant he would have overheard.
Disgusted, I managed to ask, “Your other children are alive?”
“You’d never understand.”
She’d believed Cassius would make good on his promise to kill her children. Only he’d murder their decoys—us—which would have left them safe.
She’d placed us in harm’s way.
He was never meant to fall in love with me.
“Cassius won’t know where they are.” I glowered. “You’ve kept them hidden. How would he find them after all this time?” I said with a bitterness I felt deep down to my bones.
“Stupid girl. He never knew to look for them.”
My stare shot to the empty tomb, the unspoken words hanging between us. But now he would.
“He would never hurt them . . .”
She bent low to sweep up her phone. “Your father just told me Cassius came to the house. He knows where they live.” No, I refused to believe one more lie. “Cassius will see his threat through with them.”
Pushing to my feet, I hated the seconds that dragged by in confusion, so I relented and followed her out. Looking at her differently, I threw daggers into her back because I was sickened by her. By them both.
We hurriedly returned to the house, though I didn’t bother going in. Both of us climbed into Mom’s Mercedes-Benz, and she drove us out of the Garden District at breakneck speed. I didn’t know exactly where we were going, but I knew it was to them. She didn’t have to say anything. The way she weaved in and out of traffic, she was scared.
“And you’re supposed to be the adults,” I muttered, dragging on my seat belt.
“You dare to judge me,” she seethed.
“Yes, actually, I do.”
“You have no idea what I have been through. What your father wanted to do . . .”
“Then tell me.”
“You’d never understand. You’ve never lived. You’ve been kept safe. Away from anything that would ever upset you.”
“Mom, we’ve been literally kept prisoner. You never let us out. You’re hardly home. You knew what kind of man Dad was and you didn’t stop him from hurting us.”
“He hurt me, too. You didn’t see it because I tried to protect you from his violence.”
“Protect us? You did nothing.”
“He wanted to kill them.”
My throat tightened with terror. “What?”
“Stephen refused to let them die at the hands of that man, so he was going to kill them himself.”
An ice-cold chill slithered up my spine, my mind trying to grasp what she was saying.
She looked pale. “Kill his own children. My children.” Her shrill voice rang through the air as she continued, “I didn’t let him though.” Her head shook back and forth. “No. I couldn’t let my babies die. I came up with another plan. And he agreed.” Her hands formed into a prayer.
“We were the decoy.”
“I couldn’t let them die. You’re not a mother, Anya. You wouldn’t understand.”
“It’s fucked up. You see that right?”
She stared off at nothing. “And what was it all for. . .that man is going to kill them anyways.”
I didn’t voice my own fears, but I knew Cassius, and that knowledge scared me more than anything. I’d left him full of anger and bitterness. I’d left him broken all over again.
Broken enough to kill?
I tried to hold it together and not show any fear in case she fed off it. But as more time passed, my jaw rattled with fear for those children, and my knee bounced up and down that it was taking so long to get there.
I was a mess.
Like someone had stabbed my heart with adrenaline, it pumped rapidly, feeling like it was going to beat out of my chest. If I thought it could explode, it would. I felt dizzy as she sped up, taking turns way too fast.
I wasn’t sure how long we drove. Less than an hour. But eventually, she stomped on the brake, causing the seat belt to slice me in two—or that was what it felt like because it yanked my neck with such force. I watched as she scrambled to undo her seat belt and get out.
The towering bronze gate looked secure. Mom exited, throwing the car door wide open and running toward a pedestrian entrance at the side. She rummaged around in her handbag for a key—a key for that lock. Before she could use it, the tall gate swung open.
Terror flashed over Victoria’s face as she went on through.
I knew where we were even without her telling me. This was fourteen years of truth pouring out. The past that had been hidden glaringly presented in all its ugliness.
I was going to meet the children we had replaced. Though they wouldn’t be kids any longer, I mused darkly. Like me, they’d aged and grown into young adults. They’d lived a life of seclusion, just like us. Yes, I was the decoy, but I imagined they, too, had suffered.