Liam curses under his breath.
“But he’s not connected or wealthy enough to pull any strings.” I rub at my eyes tiredly with one hand.
For the next hour, I point out the people I recognize one by one, detailing their sins to my father. None of them can pull off a cash grab like the one we intercepted, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have their own personal sins to atone for. Liam is determined to bring down the sex trade in Seattle.
We just pass a small craps table that’s been set up for entertainment when a delicate laugh sounds in my ears. My entire body tenses at the familiar lilting sound, my feet frozen to the wooden floor as I search for its origin.
I find it.
The laugh belongs to a woman in an elegant pink chiffon dress. Her back is turned, but there’s no mistaking the wild curls of strawberry blonde hair that hang loosely down her back. The woman laughs again. Gentle and musical.
“Ava,” Liam whispers urgently, trying to grab my attention, but it’s too late.
“Mom?” I call, loud enough the woman hears me, but not enough to grab the attention of everyone surrounding her.
The redheaded woman turns; her brows crease. Any hope I have in my chest deflates the minute I see the woman’s face.
She isn’t my mother.
Of course she isn’t, I chide myself. Mother is dead.
She looks exactly like her though. The same lithe frame and curly hair. The same delicate laugh that I would remember anywhere.
I don’t call out my mother’s name, but the woman still turned when I called outMom. Why?
When her gaze falls on me, her eyebrows shoot up, eyes widening, mouth slightly parted as she takes me in.
“Katherine?”
My mother’s name is a choked sob on her lips, her face paling. The man next to her jerks around at her exclamation. I recognize them.
“Oh my god.”
This is my mother’s mother.
Sheila McDonough, and next to her stands the man with the silver cross cane.
thirty-five
He is a tall, imposing man with slightly curved shoulders. The grip on his cane is tight, his knuckles turning white, face paling when he sees me.
This man knows who I am.
“Sheila.” Liam steps between the two of us as she comes barreling at me, tears spilling down her cheeks. She would have easily bowled me over. I can’t move, my body frozen in surprise and fear. “This isn’t Katherine.”
I sent the woman to take care of your obsession years ago…
The man with the silver cross cane.
This is the man who sent someone to kill my mother?
Her own father?
That doesn’t make any sense.
“You look so much like her.” Katherine’s soft-spoken voice breaks through my haze. I look up into soft green eyes that are wet and shining with unshed tears. “So much like Katherine.”
I swallow hard, a sob burning in my chest, but I am acutely aware of the man lingering just behind her. Watching our every move. Listening to our every word.
