by K. M. Scott
“She’s been worried about me, mostly. You saw her that night. My fighting makes her miserable because she’s convinced I’m going to get hurt.”
“I guess she doesn’t share your cockiness?” he asked, raising one eyebrow to punctuate his question.
“Not really. She’s not a fan of the fighting or anything that she thinks puts me in danger.”
I didn’t have to say it, but that included virtually everything I’d ever had to do for him. Working for Robert had put my life in danger from the day I met him in one way or another. The only difference now was I controlled what happened to me in fights.
“So all she’s been doing is staying in that apartment of yours and worrying? That doesn’t sound like my daughter.”
Suddenly, I began to worry this meeting had nothing to do with what I was doing behind his back but what Serena was doing to find her mother. If he even suspected she’d hired someone to locate her, he’d go to whatever lengths necessary to stop her.
Even if that meant harming her mother.
I couldn’t let that happen. Finally seeing her mother again meant too much to Serena.
“Well, she did mention something about finishing her degree,” I lied, hoping to force his focus to a topic I knew he’d have something to say about.
True to form, he frowned and shook his head. “That again? I swear that girl doesn’t understand how life works. You need to convince her to forget that nonsense. I’m sure you can do that, can’t you?”
I struggled to keep the look of disgust from my face. I didn’t share Robert’s dislike for Serena educating herself. All I wanted was for her to be happy. If that meant getting her degree, then I wanted that too for her.
Not that any of this was true since in just a few months we’d have a baby and school would probably have to take a backseat, at least for a little while. We couldn’t let Robert know about the pregnancy, though.
“I’ll see what I can do,” I answered with all the enthusiasm I could muster for promising to discourage the woman I loved from doing what she’d always wanted to do.
Clearly happy with my answer or finally bored with our discussion, Robert opened up his laptop and began reading something as he said, “Good. I look forward to seeing that cockiness in your next fight. And tell Floyd I’ll be watching to see if all he’s been doing with you is too much.”
I stood up and got the hell out of there before he decided he wanted to talk about anything else. As usual, our meeting had been like walking on eggshells, but that’s how Robert liked dealing with people. He liked to think he was keeping us on our toes.
The truth was that’s how tyrants acted, and he was nothing if not a tyrant.
Serena met me at the door, practically jumping for joy as she wrapped her arms around my neck to hug me. “I can’t believe it! It’s finally going to happen!”
I held her to me and asked, “What? What’s happening?”
She let go of me and kissed me like she hadn’t seen me in weeks. “He found her! He found her, Ryder, and I’m finally going to get to see her again.”
Tears welled in her eyes as she told me about the private detective finally locating her mother, and for the first time, she called her by name. Alita.
“I just got off the phone with him. He said he finally found her just a few miles away in a house she’s been living in for years. After all this time, I’m going to get to meet my mother again. I tried calling Janelle to tell her, but she and Charles are off on another vacation. I’ll just tell her when she gets back.”
Serena kissed me again and twirled around, ecstatic about the news the detective had just given her. My distrust of her sister kept my happiness at bay, though.
As she whirled around, I stopped her. Holding her by the shoulders, I looked into her eyes and said, “Maybe it wouldn’t be such a good idea to tell Janelle. That’s pretty much a surefire way of letting your father know.”
The smile slid from her face, and she nodded, accepting the reality of what would happen if her sister found out where her mother lived. “I guess you’re right. She’s never been really eager to see her anyway.”
“It’s still great news,” I said, hating that I’d had to bring her back down to earth with that warning.
With a hopefulness in her eyes that never failed to make my heart swell with happiness, she said, “It is, isn’t it? I can’t wait to see her again. I just hope she’s as happy to see me as I am to see her.”
I cupped her cheek and kissed her softly. “Of course she will be. I’m sure she’s wanted to see you every day since she went away.”
Leaning into my palm, Serena smiled. “And in just a little while, she’s going to have a grandchild, so this is perfect timing. I knew if I believed it would happen someday.”
Nothing made me happier than seeing her excited about finally getting to know her mother. With the fight coming up that would give us enough money to leave and now this, it felt like everything was finally coming together for us. We’d had to wait longer than either of us had wanted, but at long last, I saw the light at the end of the tunnel that signaled a life after this place.
A life away from Robert Erickson and all the ugliness of his world.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Serena
Even though Ryder wanted to go with me to see my mother just in case something happened, I chose to see her for the first time alone. I knew he worried about me, especially now since I was pregnant, but this was my mother. She wasn’t going to do any harm to me.
As I drove toward the address in New Windsor the detective gave me, I couldn’t believe she’d been just thirty miles away all this time. Had my father known this?
I knew the truth was he probably had been the one to send her there, but I didn’t want to believe that he’d known she was less than an hour away for all these years as I begged him to find her. My father had never wanted me to see her, but was he really that much a monster to do this?
Whatever he’d done or not done, I’d found her at last, and nothing would stop me from getting to know the woman who’d given birth to me. I wanted to share all those things I’d experienced with her, to see her face when I told her about growing up and then meeting Ryder. I wanted her to be in our child’s life from the very beginning.
My GPS alerted me that I needed to turn left onto a long winding road leading to an enormous grey stone home in the distance. As grand as the one I grew up in, the very sight of it made me happy. I’d worried she had been forced to live in squalor because of my father’s spitefulness, but the house I saw now said otherwise.
Pulling up in front of the home, I marveled at how beautiful her home was. My hands began to shake at the reality that in mere seconds, I’d finally be face-to-face with the one person I’d wanted to see for so long. What would I say first? Would she even recognize me after all these years?
I squeezed the steering wheel tightly and took a deep breath. This is what I’d wanted since I was six years old. I could do this.
But what if Janelle was right? What if she chose to leave us and didn’t want to know her daughters? What if my finding her would be something she hated instead of a surprise she’d love?
Suddenly, I lost my will. I couldn’t bear to finally meet my mother only to have her show me she never missed me at all.
My mouth grew dry, and my emotions began to spin out of control. If she shunned me like my father had always said she did when she left us, I wouldn’t be able to handle it. The single dream I’d kept alive all these years would be dead, and everything my father had said about her would be proven right.
I couldn’t face that.
Putting the car into gear, I looked in the rearview mirror to turn around and leave, but a knock on my car window stopped me. A man with light hair and a big smile who looked to be around my age motioned for me to put down the window. I didn’t want to talk to him, no matter how happy he looked. This had all been a big mistake, and all I wanted to do was go home.
&n
bsp; But he knocked again and I didn’t want to just leave him standing there grinning at me without even telling him a lie that I’d gotten lost, so I rolled down the window and returned his smile.
“I’m sorry. I took a wrong turn and before I knew it, I was here. Sorry about that.”
“Oh, it’s no problem, miss. What were you looking for?”
My mind raced to remember a single road name I’d seen along the way, but not one came to mind.
Stammering, I tried to bluff my way out of what had already become an awkward conversation. “Oh…I…I mean…it’s no big deal. I was just looking for a different place.”
The man chuckled. “I got that. But what I’m asking is what house were you looking for? This house sits on twenty-five acres, so wherever you were headed, you missed it by a mile.”
“Or two,” I mumbled, embarrassed by my lame attempt at lying.
We stared at each other in silence for a few moments until he introduced himself. He took his work gloves off and thrust his hand in through the window. “I’m Michael. I work the estate as the chief gardener.”
I shook his calloused hand. “I’m Serena. I was looking for someone who lives here.”
Michael looked puzzled by my statement. “Then you really must have the wrong house. Nobody lives here. At least not in the main house. It’s been empty for years. The man who owns it comes to visit every few months, but other than that, it’s more like a museum than a home.”
Had the private detective gotten the address wrong?
“Oh, well, I guess I should go then and find the right house.”
He stared at me for a moment and shook his head. “You wouldn’t be looking for Alita, would you? I just noticed you look like her.”
“Alita?”
“She lives here, but not in the big house. She lives in the carriage house at the back of the property. I think she’s at home right now.”
The carriage house? Why would my mother not live in the main house?
I wanted to ask Michael, but having a stranger explain her circumstances seemed wrong. But I needed to know who the owner of this house was, even though in my gut I had a sneaking suspicion of the name that would come out of his mouth.
“Who owns this property?” I asked and held my breath as I waited for his answer.
“The owner is Robert Erickson. I can get you his information if you’d like to talk to him, but I don’t think he’s looking for potential tenants for the house.”
My heart sank as I heard my father’s name. He had known where my mother was all this time, and he’d lied over and over every time I asked about her. Even worse, he’d hidden her out here and made my mother live in a carriage house while he left the main house empty, like she wasn’t worthy of living in a home as nice as ours.
I hung my head as these thoughts got tangled up in my emotions and tears welled in my eyes. Maybe she had wanted to see me like I’d wanted to see her all these years.
“Are you okay? Is something wrong?” Michael asked.
Willing the tears away, I looked at him and smiled as I turned off the car. “Maybe I’ll take a look around, if that’s okay.”
He opened my door for me and spread his arms. “The place is yours to explore. If you have any questions about the gardens, please ask because I’m your man on that front. Anything else, I might have to bluff the answer, but I’ll do my best.”
“Thank you. Can I assume the gardens are Italian with sharp angles and the shrubbery formed into geometric shapes?” I asked as I began to walk around the main house.
“How did you know?” he said, calling after me.
Disappointed I’d been able to so correctly describe my father’s taste, I forced a smile. “I had a feeling.”
Left alone, I walked what felt like the entire twenty-five acres until I reached a tiny light grey cottage. My heart contracted as I judged the entire house to be little bigger than a garden shed. Why was she exiled here and to such a tiny home after living in our house? Her home now would practically fit in our entryway.
A mix of anger and apprehension swirled inside me as I walked toward the front door of the cottage. Flanked by pink rose bushes just beginning to bloom, its pale yellow color welcomed me. I wanted to believe that it opened to a warm home comfortable for her.
I knocked as my heart slammed against my chest and a lump filled my throat. My hands shook from fear that everything my father had ever said about my mother was true. Even if only some of it was, she might not have ever wanted to see me again.
The door opened and there she stood looking out at me like she was seeing a ghost. Her dark eyes so similar to mine grew wide, and her mouth opened like she wanted to say something to me, but no words came out.
She was as beautiful as I remembered her being. Dark brown hair fell in loose waves barely grazing her shoulders. Her tan skin looked warm and touchable, and I had to control my urge to reach out and brush my fingertips over her high cheekbones.
“Serena?” she asked quietly, her tone full of disbelief.
“It’s me, Mom. It’s Serena.”
She buried her face in her hands, and I heard her sob, “I’ve dreamed of what this would be like for so long, but now that you’re here, it’s even better than I imagined.”
I instinctively wrapped my arms around her and hugged her to me. “It’s really you. I can’t believe it. After all this time, I found you.”
Lifting her head, she wiped the tears from under her eyes and smiled. “How? How did you find out where I was? Your father told me he’d never let you know.”
“I hired a private detective to find you because he wouldn’t tell me where you were. He said you disappeared.”
She nodded her head sadly. “Yes, I assumed that’s what he told you girls.” Looking around me, she asked, “What about Janelle? Is she here with you too?”
“No, it’s just me. Janelle doesn’t know I found you. Nobody does. Well, except Ryder.”
My mother closed the front door and smiled. “I can tell by the way your eyes lit up when you said his name that he’s someone you care about. Your eyes always told the whole story, even when you were a little girl.”
My hands cupped my baby bump. “He means the world to me.”
Her gaze focused on where my hands sat, and her eyes grew wide again. “Oh, my God! Are you pregnant?”
“Yes, but nobody knows. I haven’t told Daddy or Janelle. You see, Ryder and I aren’t married and he works for Daddy, so…”
The myriad of reasons why Ryder and I hadn’t been able to marry yet filled my head, but they were too difficult to explain. He loved me and I loved him, and that’s all that mattered.
My mother gently placed her hand over mine and closed her eyes. “You don’t have to explain your father to me. I know all about him and what he can do to someone if he decides they went against his wishes. Just tell me he’s not like the other men who work for your father and that’s all I’ll need to know.”
I shook my head and sighed. “He’s nothing like them. He’s smart and brave, and he protects me, even from Daddy.”
“Good. I worried you and your sister would get caught up in your father’s world and never have the chance to be with someone you truly love. Ryder sounds like he deserves you, and that’s all I’ve ever prayed for.”
She led me into her kitchen, a quaint room painted in pale yellow like her front door and even more welcoming, and we sat down at a tiny table covered in a white tablecloth. As I watched her, I couldn’t shake the thought that she belonged somewhere grander.
“Why did you go?” I blurted out, needing to know the answer to that question more than any other.
Frowning, she said, “I didn’t have a choice. He sent me away, Serena.”
“Why?”
She tilted her chin up and with a look of defiance explained, “I wouldn’t accept his affairs and told him I was leaving and taking you girls with me. That night, two of his men grabbed hold of me as I walked from your room an
d drove me here. Your father was waiting for me and told me if I wanted to stay alive, I’d accept it. I didn’t want to live for a long time when he sent me away from you girls, but I kept a tiny hope alive that one day I’d be able to see you again.”
“Did you ever try?” I asked, knowing how unfair that question was but still needing to know.
“I asked about you every time I saw him, Serena. Every time, I begged him to let me see you, but by the time you were a teenager, he said you didn’t want to see me ever again because I’d abandoned you. But I didn’t. I swear to you I would have been there every day if he hadn’t exiled me here.”
“He told us you just disappeared one night. I couldn’t understand why you would go,” I said as the emotions from that time long ago came rushing back.
She reached across the table and touched my hand. “I never wanted to go. I missed you and your sister more than you can ever know. I pleaded with your father to let me come back. I promised I wouldn’t take you anywhere. I even told him I’d look the other way concerning the other women, but it didn’t matter. He always said no.”
Choking back tears, I said, “A man kidnapped me when I was seven. When it happened, I actually convinced myself that you were behind it and had finally found a way to get me. I waited the whole time I was at that house for that man to say he was taking me to you.”
Through blurry eyes, I saw my mother begin to cry. “Oh, honey, I’m so sorry. I should have been there for you. I’m so sorry, Serena.”
“I had no one after that. Daddy took me out of school because I couldn’t stop talking about it. I didn’t know how to deal with everything. I just wanted someone to talk to, but nobody wanted to be friends with me because I just couldn’t stop myself from…”
Pressing my lips together, I refused to let the words that had been in my head for so long come out. I didn’t want to be that person anymore. Friendless. Alone. Poor little Serena.
I wasn’t that person anymore. I wasn’t alone now. I had Ryder.
My mother lightly squeezed my hand, and I saw the sadness in her eyes. I’d seen that same sadness every time I looked in the mirror growing up.