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“I did not,” my mother hollers.
Gigi is undeterred. She stands, stalks across the room, her finger pointing angrily. “I’ve always known it. You hated him for leaving you. You think I didn’t know you were talking to him? You think I didn’t know he was still seeing you? I knew, but I also knew how desperate he was to keep contact with his children. You and that devil he called a father wouldn’t let him.”
My mother’s on her feet again, too. Her eyes blazing, the heat of her anger has dried her tears and the two women meet in the middle of the room.
We all watch in fascination as the two normally dignified, stoic women practically bump chests.
“You shut your ignorant, thieving mouth,” my mother seethes. “You don’t know anything. He loved me. Until you came to town with all of your bullshit about chasing your happiness and you stole him. I didn’t kill him. I should have though. Should have left his faithless ass to rot in that gutter. But I knew he was still alive and the colossal fool that I am, I still love him. So I saved him. And then, I tried to hide him. Because if the person who tried to kill him found out he was still alive, he’d try again. What did you do? Give up your baby, marry another man and then move to Italy.”
Gigi’s hand flies toward her, palm open.
My mother catches it.
“You don’t have the right,” she hisses. “I wish it had been you in that ditch. You deserved to be there.” She drops Gigi’s wrist like it’s filth she’s holding and marches back to her chair.
Gigi stands there, her shoulders drooping, her eyes forlorn. Hayes walks over, drops a kiss on her forehead, shoots me a warning look that says “move this shit show along,” and takes her back to her seat.
“So, what happened?” I ask my mother.
“I got him a place to live. But he left and I had no idea where he’d gone. I hired a man a few years ago and found him. The guy told me he got a dog and named it Gigi.”
Gigi gasps.
“Even when he can’t remember his own children. He remembered her,” she spits at Gigi.
Then turns accusing eyes at me and my siblings. “And even though he left you, you still love him more than you’ll ever love me. Me, who has given everything to keep you safe. I wanted to tell you the truth so many times. So you would know who he really was… is.”
She sighs heavily, covers her face with her hands and bends at the waist. I watch her and wait. I want to comfort her. But I know she won’t want it.
“I found him in that ditch by chance. We were supposed to meet that day, and he was late. Lucas was never late. I went as close to their house as I dared and parked and walked around a little. That ditch runs behind their house. I found him about half a mile away. And took him to the hospital.”
“Why didn’t you call me?” Gigi asks.
My mother scoffs. “I wasn’t sure you hadn’t put him there. I thought maybe he’d reverted to type and was cheating on you, too,” she says snidely. The blood drains from her face.
“He would never—”
“Wait. What did you tell Pops?” I interrupt Gigi and turn to my mother.
And for the first time since this conversation started, I see real, unadulterated panic in her eyes.
“He was away when I got back from San Antonio. I went to his office to look for something and found your father’s rings. The rings that had been on the fingers that had been cut off his hand.”
The world stops spinning. I stare down at my hand in horror, at the ring on my own finger. The one my grandfather gave me right before he died. I tug it off and drop it on to the table.
I look between her and it. “You’re lying.”
“I’m not,” she says so simply, with so much defeat. “I logged into his computer. He didn’t even have it password protected. He couldn’t imagine that anyone would dare look through his things. I found the emails—he never even bothered to delete them between him and the man he hired to kill your father. He was to bring those rings back as proof.”
“Why would he do that? That makes no sense. He was his heir.”
“No, Remi. He hated Lucas. He was an utter disappointment.”
“So he disinherited him. Why in the world would he want to kill him?”
“Because Lucas wasn’t going to go quietly into the night. Not without what was his.”
“He wanted money?” I ask incredulously.
