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I tend to the plants. I visit with Ace down at the club. Every week, I meet Tori and Olivia at the park. My life goes on, but nothing feels the same. For so long, the uncertainty of my future has hung over my head, and now that it’s wide open, I should be relieved. But I can’t be relieved knowing Bianca is just down the street, and she wants nothing to do with me.
Today, as I’m leaving the compound to go visit Zoe, I stop just outside the gates when I recognize a familiar car sitting there. It was the same car I saw at the hospital when Bianca was trying to leave. It’s her mother.
I pull to a stop and get off my bike, meeting Maria’s gaze as she slowly exits the vehicle. There’s a weariness to her features I feel deep in my bones, and as much as I resent her, I can’t help relating to her at this moment.
“Madden.” She greets me cautiously. “Can we talk?”
“I can’t imagine anything we have to talk about.” I stare out at the road.
“I know we didn’t get off to a good start,” she says quietly. “In fact, I judged you quite unfairly. That’s become glaringly obvious. But I want to thank you for taking care of my daughter. For looking after her and keeping her safe. Just knowing that she’s alive…” Her voice fractures, and she breaks down into tears. “Is more than I could have ever hoped for.”
I shift, uncomfortable with her display of emotion. It was a hell of a lot easier when I believed she was the antichrist, but right now, it’s impossible not to see her as human. It still doesn’t change what went down, though.
“I won’t let anything happen to her,” I reply. “I’ll never allow anyone to hurt her again. That includes you.”
Maria presses a palm to her chest and tries to suppress a sob. “I know I messed up. If you don’t think I carry that with me every day, I do. I’ve carried that guilt for so long, it’s my only companion. But seeing what Adam did to her, those tapes the detectives showed me…”
She doesn’t finish her thought because her emotions overtake her, and I don’t have it in me to offer her false comfort. Bianca was with Adam because they thought he was the better choice.
It takes Maria a few minutes to gather herself, and I’m not sure what the point of her coming here is. If she thought she’d see Bianca, she’s dead wrong. And if she thought forgiveness might be on the table, she’s barking up the wrong tree.
“The doctors said she must have been so deeply traumatized, the only way for her to survive was to disconnect completely.” Maria sniffs. “She never told me how bad it really was. I knew they fought, and I could see things weren’t going well. But I didn’t realize the extent of it. If I had, I would have done something about it.”
“Right,” I scoff. “And what about the contracts?”
“I know you won’t believe me when I say this,” Maria croaks. “But I love my daughter, Madden. I thought I was doing the right thing for everyone. I thought Adam could give her a beautiful life, and my husband would be able to live. But if I had known the truth, I would have canceled the contracts myself and let us go bankrupt. I wouldn’t have subjected her to that. You have to believe me.”
The air between us is ripe with tension as I consider her. I honestly expected her to deny it had anything to do with the contracts, and I don’t know what to say. She just outright admitted that she used her daughter as a bargaining chip, confirming that what Bianca told me from the beginning was true. Her father lied to cut me out of her life and try to convince me she was crazy, and he wasn’t the only one. My mother, Stefan, Adam. They all played a part in this. And now I’m convinced that Bianca was the only sane one among them.
“What about your husband’s line of bullshit?” I ask her. “Did you two come up with that plan together?”
Maria peers up at me with an odd expression. “What exactly did he tell you?”
“He said Bianca wasn’t well in the head. He told me she was a liar and he wasn’t sick, and you didn’t have money problems. He was pretty convincing, too. I guess he had to be to keep cashing in on the checks from TCA.”
Maria looks like she’s about to throw up, and as much as I want to blame her for this, her reaction is too intense to be anything other than genuine.
“Oh God.” She holds a trembling hand to her mouth. “He was the one who was sick in the head.”
