She's cryin' too. Tears so big they fall down her face in streams, catchin' light from the overhead fixture, turnin' her into somethin' otherworldly.
"She loved me," I say, and my voice cracks on the words. "Eleanor loved me."
Savannah nods. Can't speak.
"My mother never took a single picture of me." This truth is somethin' I never allowed myself to acknowledge. That my mother never loved me. Not the way a mother should. "Not one, Savannah. Not one damn picture. All she wanted was to forget who I came from. Forget what Matthias left behind when he disappeared."
I turn another page. Another memory Eleanor preserved.
"But Eleanor was there. Preserving every moment. Like I was worth rememberin'. Like I mattered."
The pages progress. Me at nineteen, twenty, twenty-one. The tattoos spreadin' across my skin like armor, like prophecy, like the visual representation of everything I was becomin'.
Then the studio portraits begin.
Professional shots. Composed. Intentional.
Me shirtless. Back turned. Angels descendin' across my shoulder blades.
Me facin' forward. Chest bare. The war inked into my flesh on full display.
Then me completely naked. Every angle, but instead of being exposed, I am covered in just the right amount of shadow.
Art made from flesh, and ink, and light.
I blow out a breath and tap the picture. "All these were at her studio in Glendive."
Savannah sniffles. "I didn't even know she had that studio until after she died. It was in the will. I…" She stops to cry for a moment. "I never even went to look at it. I just… had it sold."
Fuck. That's rough. But I have to keep goin’. I can’t stop now. "All she wanted was to turn me into art. To see somethin' beautiful in what everyone else called trash. And I let her. Because for one hour, standin' under those lights while she worked—I got to be more than Legion Kane. More than the demon. More than the curse.
"She loved my father," I say. The words come easier now, like confession. "Matthias Kane. He rode through Drybone in the late nineties with the Sons of Dust. Eleanor loved him. Wanted him. But he chose my mother instead. The waitress with nothin' to offer except herself." I look at Savannah. “Why? Why the hell would anyone choose her over your mother?”
Savannah's hand finds mine, gives me a squeeze. “Well, I’m not sure, Legion. But I bet that Marcus White Jr. has been askin’ himself that very same question for the better part of three months now.”
I actually chuckle at that. “Yeah. I bet that son-of-a-bitch is. My mama got pregnant. And then Matthias left her. Left everyone, because he didn’t really leave, he was dead. Eleanornever forgot him. Never stopped lookin' for him in every shadow, every stranger. And then… she found me."
I tap the picture again.
"This book was supposed to be mine. Eleanor tried to give it to me a dozen times. But I refused. Told her it would get lost. Ruined. That I didn't deserve her art, couldn't honor it the way it deserved."
I look at Savannah.
"I told her to keep it safe. To hide it somewhere nobody could destroy it."
My voice drops to barely a whisper.
Then I actually laugh. "She hid it in a fuckin' bomb shelter."
Savannah laughs too.
I turn another page. Find the last photograph in the book. The selfie. Eleanor and me in a truck, summer sun blazin', both of us smilin' genuine smiles. I remove it from the book and look at Savannah. "We did have a secret, though."
She sucks in a breath, afraid of what I'm gonna say.
But I say it anyway. Holding up the photo. "She was dyin', Savannah. A month before we took this road trip, she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer."
Savannah gasps. "What? What are you talkin' about? She didn't die of cancer! She had a…"
