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Then, taking a breath, I placed my hand in his own. His skin was warm, and as he wrapped his hands around my smaller one. I allowed the warmth of his touch to comfort me.
“You do not have to do this,” he repeated.
My mouth was dry, and I was unable to speak. Instead, I just nodded and allowed Dom to lead me off the bus. I knew that I did not need to do this.
I owed my mother less than nothing. But I needed to see her. I could not keep running from the past, and if she had answers for me that would help my future, I would do anything to get them.
* * *
My heels clanged on the linoleum floors as a guard led me through the room. Families were reuniting all around us, and I was struck by the sense of normality in the air. Even as I felt as though my heart were going to pound out of my chest, there were people here who were glad to be reunited with loved ones.
I wondered why the people who were in here, who could not hug their children for fear of the guards dragging them back to their cells, would risk such a thing.
“She’s over there,” the guard who escorted me into the room said.
Dom had not been pleased to discover that his considerable influence had not been enough to get him inside with me. It was only because of Ezra Wright that I was even getting a personal escort.
I thought it was unnecessary. After all, there were guards at the ready; my mother would not even be able to reach out and take me by the hand if she wanted to. No one was going to harm me in here.
“I won’t be too far, and there are other guards.”
I nodded but did not say anything. I had seen my mother the moment that I walked into the room. It was difficult not to notice her.
Despite the orange jumpsuit, she looked a great deal as she always had. Tall and thin with bright blonde hair. Her blue eyes were large in her face, which was now a great deal more wrinkled than it had been the last time I saw her.
I snorted as I walked towards her. My mother’s reach was far, but even she was not able to get Botox in prison.
As I walked towards my mother, I took a deep, calming breath. Though I knew that she could not do anything to me, I still felt myself tremble as I approached her.
Even before I knew my mother’s true nature, I feared her. The two of us had never gotten along. Even when I was a child and wanted nothing more than for my mother to love me. No matter what I did, it seemed impossible. Nikolai was the apple of her eye.
Considering where she led my brother, I was better off.
“I was surprised to see you on my visitor log,” my mother said, as I stood at the head of the table. My fingers were wrapped around the handle of my bag as I tried to keep them from trembling. I was certain that my mother could smell my weakness.
“You wrote to me,” I said, taking a seat across from her.
Now that I was closer, I could see the ways that her confinement had started to take a toll on her.
There weren’t just wrinkles on her skin, but there were grays at her temple. The once bright blonde of her hair was fading, and the age that she long attempted to hide was showing through.
Still, her chin was lifted, and her eyes were still bright with defiance. As I looked at her, I wondered for the millionth time how I had not seen the truth in her all those years.
“I have been writing you for two years, and you have never answered me, nor have you come to visit.”
“I did not see the point,” I told her, honestly. “I was not interested in absolving you of your sins.”
My mother snorted and her brow rose. “You think that I was writing to you for absolution?”
My heart squeezed in my chest. “Weren’t you?”
“No.”
I could feel my cheeks heating with anger. “I suppose it was too much for me to expect that you would want to apologize for trying to murder me.”
My mother rolled her eyes. “I was never trying to kill you, and you are well aware of that. It was your husband I wanted dead.”
I was not surprised that she was openly admitting to trying to kill Dom. After all, she was serving life in prison for her crimes. There was nothing that she could say that would get her out of her predicament.
