Page 5 of Savage Surrender

“B.” He stumbles forward.

I catch him around the waist while he wrestles his crutches back into place.

“What’s going on?” he asks.

“I need to talk to Mom.”

He studies my face, then looks at Weller. Weller hands him the photo. And his face works from confusion to shock. “Who is this?”

“The devil’s mother.”

“No. How the fuck?”

The front door opens before we knock like she sensed we were coming. Mom stands there in her garden apron with dirt on her hands. Relief crosses her face first, then worry. She pulls me into a hug that smells like banana bread and lavender soap.

My throat feels tight.

“Honey, you didn’t tell me you were coming.” She steps back and looks from Winston to Weller, who’s waiting at the edge of the porch. “I would’ve made dinner.”

“We’re not here for dinner, Mom. We need to talk.”

Her gaze drifts to the SUV idling at the curb, Ellis’s silhouette visible behind the wheel. “Of course. Come inside.”

The smell of the house hits me the moment I cross the threshold. For one dizzy second, I’m twelve and nothing terrible has happened yet. The floorboards still creak in the same places. I step over the bad one beside the entry table without thinking.

Mom twists her dirty hands in her apron. “Let me get everyone something to drink. I have lemonade, or I can make coffee⁠—”

“Mom.” Winston maneuvers through the doorway, his tone sharp. “Sit down.”

She freezes. “What’s going on?” she asks. “Or should I say, what else? Just tell me. I can’t stand the suspense.”

I start pacing, and then stop to press my fingers against the scars on my knees through my dress. I force myself to stop.

The nervous habit I picked up the first time I was ever assaulted. Being a girl is dangerous for your health.

Fun, but scary.

“Who is my father?”

Mom blinks. “What kind of question is that? Bianca, you know who your father is.”

“I know who raised me. I know who carried me on his shoulders until I was much too old for it.”

She lowers herself onto the floral couch. “Then what are you asking? Why would you think anyone else was your father?”

I hold the picture out to her.

Mom accepts it and frowns at the woman in the picture. “Who is this?”

“Dr. Montgomery’s mother.”

Her hands go still. “No.” She shakes her head but doesn’t look away from the photograph. “That can’t be right. Where did you get this?”

“The internet,” Weller says from beside the door.

Mom’s lips part and her hand starts trembling. The photograph creases in her grip.

Winston shifts forward, knocking one of his crutches against the coffee table. “Do you want to explain what is going on?”