Chapter 15 #2
"I straight-up asked Mom if she'd ever been to Australia. She denied it, of course. I gave her a few chances to think hard about her answer, but she still claimed she’d never been.
So I told her about your call and the old suitcase that was found.
Again, she denied it. But I knew she was lying.
You know that picture you sent me, of the logo on that suitcase? "
"Yeah?" Cassidy frowned but nodded.
"I knew as soon as I saw the photo that the luggage was Mom's. She had nearly everything monogrammed with our emblem, and her suitcases were always red. There was no doubt it was hers. But she refused to admit it. That made me furious and only more determined to get the truth out of her."
Cassidy's expression softened as if she knew exactly what it was like to be lied to by someone you trusted.
"I showed Mom the photo and told her the suitcase was found in a plane that had crashed about thirty-five years ago. Mom laughed." My voice turned hard. "She always does that when a conversation doesn't go the way she wants." I handed Cassidy the coffee.
Cassidy took a sip and rested her hands around the tin cup.
"Mom was adamant that there must be some mistake. So I told her about the human remains found in the plane wreck."
Cassidy brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. "What did she say?"
"It was what she didn't say. She didn't ask any questions. A normal person asks who called? Or asks where the case was found? Or what did the suitcase look like? Whose remains? What plane? What region? What year? She did none of that. She just denied it was hers."
Cassidy nodded. "So what happened?" Her lips parted like she was going to say more, but she didn't.
"The more Mom pretended she didn't know anything about that suitcase in the photo, the harder I pushed. When she refused to tell me, I told her I was going to Australia to get the answers from Frank Branson."
Cassidy whistled. "Oh, shit."
Mom had reacted like she'd been tasered the moment I'd said his name. She’d lost her polish, her control, her calm. All in the blink of an eye.
Crack.
The blood had drained from her skin, and her eyes had flown wide. She'd looked absolutely terrified. Mom was always in control, but the mention of Frank had tipped her off-center, and I needed to know why.
"That's when Mom lost it. She said if I kept digging, I'd cause problems." I poked my finger into the jagged hole in my slacks. "Mom didn't say problems for me. She said problems. As if she was protecting something much bigger than her own reputation."
I stared out at the paddock where the heat shimmered across the grass. The landscape was both brutal and beautiful. Raw and real. Qualities I rarely experienced in New York.
Cassidy put the cup down, and the space between us narrowed to almost nothing. She ran her hands down her jeans.
"I didn't back down with Mom like I usually do. Not this time. The moment I mentioned Frank Branson, she changed. And I knew I was right about the case, which also confirmed she’d been to Australia, which also confirmed she was lying."
"Why did she lie?" Cassidy's light blue eyes drilled into me, and my heart pounded in my ears as I forced myself to continue. "Mom said …" I swallowed, hating that I had to say this out loud.
"What?" Cassidy's gaze stayed on me, unwavering.
I looked away, because I could still see Mom's face with her bloodshot eyes, her red, trembling lips, her cold, calculating stare when she’d realized I would not back down. "She said Frank raped her."
"Shit." Her hand flew to her mouth. Cassidy's entire body went rigid beside me. "Oh, God. I know Dad's an evil bastard, but?—"
I turned back to her. "But I kept asking for more details. Did she go to the police? Why didn't she have Frank arrested?" I shook my head. "Mom told me to shut up and leave it alone. That I had no idea what I was getting messed up in."
Cassidy's hand moved an inch toward mine on the step, then stopped. It hovered there, then retreated to her lap, where she gripped her knee instead. "But you didn't stop."
"No." Anger bubbled in my veins at the memory. "I couldn't let it go. I needed to know about the suitcase and the plane crash. And was she even on that plane? And whose remains were found? I asked her if Dad knew what Frank did to her."
"Did he?" Cassidy's voice was soft, and when I glanced at her, she was watching me with an intensity that stole my breath away.
"That's when Mom went really crazy. She told me to stop it, shut up, and forget about it all. She kept saying how much she'd sacrificed for me, blaming me for her lies."
I stared at my hands. "I said if she didn't tell me everything, I would ask Frank Branson myself.”
“Ooh, I bet that got a reaction.”
“Yep. She stood up so fast she knocked her wine glass over. Then she jabbed my chest and said, 'Don't you dare.'"
Cassidy's throat worked as she swallowed.
"I'd never heard that tone from her before. Not directed at me, anyway. Not like that. She wasn't just angry, she was terrified."
I clenched my fists. "Mom grabbed my arm. Hard. She told me that if I went to Australia, I would destroy everything."
"Everything?" Cassidy frowned. "Such as?"
I stared at the scorched earth in front of us. "That was when I knew she wasn't protecting me. She was protecting herself and her lies. So I told her I was going to Australia, and I was telling Dad why."
The memory pressed in hard now.
"Mom glared at me like I was one of the beggars on the streets that she loathed. She realized she couldn't control me anymore." I shook my head slowly. "That's when she told me …" I paused, swallowing hard.
The next part sat in my chest like mud, and if I didn't say it now, it would choke me. I looked at the blackened paddock stretching beyond the cottage, then back at Cassidy.
She nodded as if she knew what I was going to say. Her eyes never left my face.
"That's when she told me Dominic Hawthorne wasn't my father, Frank Branson was." My gut turned cold the same way it had when Mom had blurted those words at me.
Cassidy's eyes softened, and she shook her head. "But if she lied about so much other stuff, how can you believe her about that?"
The wind moved through the grass. Our shoes steamed in the sun. Somewhere far off, a crow cawed—harsh and lonely.
Her question sat between us like something dangerous.
And there was a real possibility she was right.
However, I'd spent my entire life trying to measure up to a man I couldn't stand, always feeling like an impostor in Dominic Hawthorne's world, always obeying my mother's wishes to learn from Dominic—the man she’d pretended was my father.
She wanted me to be like him, to control Hawthorne Global like him. To be as ruthless as he was.
If Frank Branson were my father, that was the ammunition I needed to kill my ties to that fucking legacy for good.