Chapter 6 - Her Father Was Never Dead
Anthony Donnelly looked nothing like the man Bridget had described.
Not a coward.
Not a broken man.
Not someone who had simply walked away.
He looked powerful.
Older.
Cold.
And terrifyingly calm.
Mave stared at him.
"You."
He looked at her.
"I never thought I'd see you grown."
Her voice shook.
"You knew where I was."
"Yes."
"All these years?"
"Yes."
"Then why didn't you come?"
Anthony looked at Dominic.
"Because of him."
Dominic raised his gun.
Anthony laughed.
"You still point first."
"You still betray first."
Mave looked between them.
"What happened?"
Anthony answered.
"Your mother discovered that Dominic's father was planning to kill me."
Dominic interrupted.
"My father was planning to kill everyone."
Anthony shrugged.
"Same difference."
Mave's voice rose.
"Enough!"
Both men looked at her.
"You've spent my whole life making decisions about me."
She stepped forward.
"My mother hid me."
"My aunt raised me."
"My father watched from somewhere."
"And you..."
She looked at Dominic.
"You brought me here."
She turned back to Anthony.
"I deserve the truth."
Anthony's face hardened.
"Your mother had the ledger."
"What ledger?"
"The one everyone is still looking for."
"What did it contain?"
"Names."
"Whose names?"
"Every major figure who had been paid by the Ashcrofts."
Mave stared.
"Why did they want me?"
Anthony's expression changed.
"Because you were born with something else."
She waited.
"The ledger wasn't only written down."
Dominic's eyes narrowed.
"It was memorized."
Mave's heart stopped.
"By who?"
Anthony looked at her.
"Your mother."
"And me?"
"You were born while she was holding it."
Dominic stepped forward.
"What are you saying?"
Anthony looked at him.
"Eleanor told me she had a way to protect the information."
"What way?"
Anthony smiled.
"She taught it to the baby."
Silence.
Mave stared at him.
"That's impossible."
"Not in the way you think."
He pulled out a tiny metal key.
"The ledger was divided."
"Where is it?"
Anthony lifted the key.
"Your mother hid it."
"Where?"
He looked at Mave.
"Inside something you have carried your whole life."
Mave's mind raced.
Her recipe box.
Her mother's ring.
The wooden box.
She whispered, "No."
Anthony smiled.
"Yes."
Mave looked at Dominic.
"Bridget's recipe box."
Dominic immediately called Elias.
"Find it."
The box was brought to the safe house.
Inside were old recipes.
Handwritten notes.
Photographs.
A broken spoon.
A hospital bracelet.
And beneath a false bottom, a small black memory device.
Mave stared at it.
Dominic looked stunned.
Anthony's smile disappeared.
"Where is Karen?"
Gerald suddenly grabbed Anthony from behind.
A shot rang out.
Anthony collapsed.
Everything exploded into chaos.
Dominic moved Mave behind him.
Men appeared from the far end of the yard.
Gunfire tore through the night.
Mave dropped to the ground.
Dominic returned fire.
Elias pulled her behind a concrete barrier.
"Stay down!"
Mave clutched the memory device.
Then she heard a woman's scream.
Karen.
Mave looked.
Karen was being dragged toward a car.
Mave ran.
Elias shouted.
Dominic turned.
Mave reached Karen just as the car door slammed.
She grabbed Karen's hand.
A man hit her.
She fell.
Dominic arrived.
He struck the man once.
Hard.
The man collapsed.
Dominic dropped beside Mave.
"Are you hurt?"
She shook her head.
"Karen."
Dominic pulled Karen free.
Then Anthony's voice came from behind them.
"Mave."
Everyone turned.
Anthony was bleeding heavily.
He looked at his daughter.
"You have to know this."
Mave knelt beside him.
"What?"
He stared at her.
"I didn't abandon you."
"Then why?"
"Because your mother asked me to disappear."
"Why?"
"Because she knew one person she trusted would betray her."
"Who?"
Anthony looked at Dominic.
"No."
Then he looked at Mave.
"Not Dominic."
He coughed.
May you like
"The person who betrayed her is the person you've been calling Aunt Bridget."
Mave froze.
