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“I take it you had a talk with Ilya,” he eventually said, putting down his phone.
“He said my mother’s death wasn’t an accident. He said she was…” I shook my head, trying to make the images disappear. “That she was brutally murdered.” If his words weren’t enough, the pictures spoke volumes. But photographs could be manufactured.
Clinging to straws much?
You just want Kristoff to deny it, because you know what you’ll have to do if he doesn’t.
He looked grim. “She was.”
I closed my eyes for a second. Even though I had anticipated this answer, it still gutted me.
“You lied to me.” Four years ago, my mother had dropped me at his doorstep with the promise she would return. Just a day later, Kristoff told me she had died in an accident. All this time, I had believed him.
He tentatively walked up to me. “I did.”
“Why?” My voice croaked. I hated that I sounded so weak in front of him.
“You were just a kid. No child should know the loss of a parent, let alone, in your case, what had really happened.”
I moved away from him. “It wasn’t for you to decide what I get to know and when I get to know it.” I raked my hands through my hair while gearing up the courage to ask my next question. One that could cut me even more.
“It was one of Aslanov’s enemies who killed her. Apparently, they knew about me, and they had caught her scent, so to speak. There was no stalker ex. There never had been. All those times we packed up and moved was because one of Aslanov’s enemies had found us again.”
He nodded, clearly not surprised at all.
I swallowed. “Ilya said that she left me at your place to drive them away from me.”
Another nod.
“Did you know why she left? That people were after her?”
“I didn’t know about her connection to Aslanov, but I did suspect someone was after her.”
I could have been the strongest metal in the world, and still my heart would have been destroyed by the news.
“You knew why my mother was leaving and you just let her go?” Arrows of betrayal pierced my skin. “You could have saved her,” I whispered. Even my voice felt drained. “With all your connections and power, you could have kept my mother here, safe.” Instead, he’d let her face her doom with Aslanov’s enemies.
Kristoff’s face was hard like granite, like a beautiful marble statue. There was no remorse on it. Not an ounce of regret.
“Your mother chose to leave. To protect her daughter.”
I scoffed. “You make it sound like that was a good thing.”
“Why wouldn’t it be a good thing?”
“Because she chose death!” I yelled. “Because she chose to sacrifice herself for me, instead of living with me.”
Just like you will.
I was so sick and tired of being surrounded by death, lies, and betrayal.
I took a deep breath. “You kept this from me. Not only did you keep the knowledge of my father from me, but you made me believe my mother died in an accident instead of telling me she was murdered. How do you expect me to ever trust you again?”
I turned away from him, not really looking for an answer. There wasn’t anything he could say to make me feel even the slightest bit better. All I could think of was the life that could have been saved. How differently my life could have turned out. And hers too.
“Did you care?” My voice was barely more than a whisper. “Be truthful. Did you for even one second think about what could happen to my mother once she left your house?”
His silence was deafening.
