Chapter 12
I never had any memories of my parents, so when I was younger, I used to make up my own. I’d daydream about who they were, creating warm and fuzzy scenes that never happened. My favorite fake memory is of my father helping me with my schoolwork at the kitchen table. He’s so patient with me when I can’t concentrate, when my longing gaze fixes out the window. He smiles and says that if I finish my math worksheet, he’ll push me on the swing before dinner.
In my fake memory, we live on the ranch in Z, and there’s a tire swing hanging from the ancient oak tree out front. That’s where Mom finds us later as she walks up and wraps her arms around my dad from behind, nuzzling her face in his neck. The sun is setting, casting a golden glow over the ranch, and I bask in the way my parents look at each other. Soft smiles passing between them, adoration on my father’s face. Their love wraps around me like a cozy blanket, and in that one perfect moment, everything feels right.
Except none of that is real. It never happened.
My father never helped me with my homework, because he was dead.
My mother never joined us at the tire swing, because she was too busy planning a bombing that killed hundreds of Mods.
I have no memories of them, only secrets.
Secrets that Kallister knows all about, apparently.
“It’s all right,” he says when he catches my stricken expression. His voice is gentle, reassuring.
“Is it?” I counter, sneaking another step backward. Fuck. I wish I had my rifle.
“No one else at the Dagger knew your mother, so they won’t see the resemblance. But I’ll never forget those eyes.”
My eyes. Of course. These fucking things have always been a thorn in my side. A deep honey brown, with flecks of gold around the pupils. In certain lighting, they can appear yellow.
“I don’t understand. You knew this entire time who I was? From the second I stepped foot on this base?”
“Yes.”
“So you were playing me?” Bitterness coats my throat. “Pretending to trust me?”
“No. I was waiting for the right time to discuss it.”
He shifts on the bench, angling his body so he can see me better. I know he doesn’t miss how I’m creeping away. I’m not being subtle.
“I wanted to get a sense of you first. To get to know you without bringing your parents into it. I worried you’d be on guard if you realized I knew your true background, that you would shut me out before we had a chance to know each other.”
He’s right. That’s exactly what would’ve happened.
“But you knew. You knew all these years that Jim was raising Marina’s daughter.”
“I suspected the second he resurfaced after deserting the Command, suddenly in possession of a child. A child who happened to be the same age as the child Marina tragically lost in a fire.”
I frown. “There was a fire?”
He ignores the question. “My suspicions were confirmed when I saw your photo.”
“If you knew that Jim was harboring a traitor’s kid, why didn’t you say anything?”
“Because he was my brother. My blood. And it was clear how much you meant to him, judging by the lengths he went to protectyou.” Kallister pauses. “He loved your mother. Did he tell you that?”
The frank statement triggers a slew of questions, all of them biting my tongue at once. But only one flies out before I can stop it.
“Was Jim my father?”
“No,” Kallister answers. “Jake Hess was your father. I guarantee it.”
“How?”
“I tested your Company DNA sample against Julian’s. It wasn’t a match.”
