Chapter 65
Ren
It took an hour of arguing, but we had finally reached a consensus.
I agreed to stay in the house, and the guys agreed to stay out of my conversation with my mother.
I knew they were just trying to protect me and be supportive, but this was something I needed to do on my own.
This was between her and me and no one else.
I found Mum in the den, staring out the window like a figment of my imagination. I pushed down the emotions clawing up the back of my throat and took a deep breath. Part of me wanted to run to her, wrap my arm around her, and never let go. But that couldn’t happen until I had answers.
Detective Conway was sitting on the arm of the chair, while the other guard I now recognized and remembered his name to be, Mylo, stood by the fireplace. They looked at me right away, but it took my mother longer. Seconds ticked by, and I refused to be the first one to acknowledge her.
“Detective Conway, such a surprise to see you here,” I said, not even trying to hide my sarcasm.
The Mikhailov polar bear on his right hand was hard to miss.
“Funny…I don’t remember seeing your tattoo when we met at the police station. Makeup really does work well to cover things you want to hide. I’m not used to detectives being so deceitful.”
“There is no reason to be angry with Vlad or Mylo. They have protected us your whole life, and they were just following my orders,” Mum said.
She sipped something steaming from the cup in her hands and then slowly turned to face me.
She looked the same, but there was something different there, too.
Something colder, harsher. I’d seen it last night, and even though her eyes were warm when she gazed at me, the iciness was all around her.
In the way she held her head, her hands. Even the way she stood was different.
“Hello, Ren. I have been dreading this conversation,” she said, and it stung like a slap to the face.
“Oh, really?” I folded my hands in front of me. “Funny, since I never pictured us having it at all.”
The corner of my mother’s mouth twitched. She walked toward me, and I lifted my chin, held her gaze, and didn’t back away.
“You have grown so much in such a short time. I’m so proud of you.”
“Can we please just stop with the pleasantries? I want to know what the hell is going on. I deserve answers,” I said.
“There is nothing I can say to make what I did any better. There is no excuse good enough to wipe away what you’ve endured since I left.”
“You mean since you faked your death. Lied to the world. Then thought it would be a great idea to show up at Dad’s dinner to announce your comeback by threatening to kill a man at the table.”
“I know you’re angry, and you have every right to be,” she said, and that only pissed me off more.
“You’re right, I do.”
Mum nodded and finished her drink before sitting down.
“Join me.”
I almost told her to shove it, but that wouldn’t get me what I wanted.
“I don’t understand any of this,” I said, taking the chair across from her.
“My entire life has been one giant lie. You left me all alone to figure it out myself. You left Neil, the man I thought was my father, vulnerable and exposed, and he ended up dead. You were off doing God knows what, while I suffered from nightmares and waded through guilt. Why did she save me? Why did I go into that closet? Could I have done something to save you? The entire time, you were—”
“I was finishing what was started years ago. It was something I had to do, and unfortunately, I needed the world to believe that I was dead to keep you safe, and my enemies unaware and off balance.”
“What does any of that mean?”
She sighed and leaned back, looking regal in the large beige and gold wingback chair. She resembled a queen on a throne, while I was the annoying princess asking too many questions.
“When we went on the run, the initial plan was to go to your father. We would live in Italy with him and be protected by the Genovese name.”
“Yes, I’m aware. Dad filled me in on what happened,” I said.
“Well, then you know that if I went to your father after I shot Christov, there would’ve been a war.
One that could last for generations. I ran and hid us, instead.
Right or wrong, I wanted you to grow up like any other kid.
Not surrounded by guards with guns, enemies hiding around every corner, always looking over your shoulder, and never knowing if someone was really a friend. And you did.”
She smiled, and her whole face transformed into the woman I remembered. Warm, compassionate, and carefree.
“I understand why you ran then. What I don’t understand is why you faked your death. If you wanted me act like you were, I could’ve done that. You could’ve explained everything to me.”
Her smile faded.
“No, I couldn’t. I couldn’t take the chance that you’d confide in the wrong person, or that our lives hinged on your acting skills. I couldn’t do that to you.”
“No, you just gave me PTSD instead.”
“Ren, I raised you to be a free thinker, able to make your own choices. So, tell me. If I had shared everything about my life and future plans with you and then dropped you off at Wayward with instructions to pretend I was dead, what would you have done? Would you want that knowledge on your shoulders? For my life to literally be in your hands?”
Leaning back, I crossed my arms and stayed quiet. I hated that her reasoning made sense.
“It might have worked out, but it would have been no less traumatic. I never wanted you to carry that kind of responsibility. Wayward was the best and safest place for you. You could finish school without worrying about money, and most of all, you were protected by the Curators. I couldn’t have asked for anything more while I was… away.”
I stood and paced, unable to sit still.
“None of this explains why. Why, then? What changed?”
Something dark passed behind her eyes, and then it was gone.
“Like I already said, there is nothing I can say that will make any of this better. But know that I have spent the last year dismantling families and businesses that supported my father and Christov.”
My eyebrows shot up before I could hide my surprise.
“Yes, I knew he was alive. I became aware of that about three months before I faked my death, but I assumed he was still in Russia. I was wrong.”
My mind was blown and not in a good way. Logic told me she needed to be strategic, but my heart hurt like she’d just stabbed me.
“So, Vadin, your father, is here because…”
“I killed everyone who supported him and took every last cent he had to fund my vendetta against him, Christov, and Lawrence. He is here because he knows that his time is up. His home is burned to ash, like he burned the world around me. The funds he managed to take with him when he ran are low. He is either looking for protection or your trust fund.”
“You tracked him here, and your plan was to, what? Waltz in, say surprise, and then shoot him in the head, with no regard for anyone else.”
“Everything I’ve done is because I love you. These men will never stop coming after us. This is all to protect you, and sometimes the wrong thing must be done for the right reason,” Mum said.
“Bullshit.”
Fuming, I marched across the room.
“I’m so sick of people saying they have to keep secrets out of love and to protect me. Every decision you’ve made has a dozen alternatives. Forget everything else for a moment. What you did last night was reckless and selfish.”
I pointed at her.
“How dare you act no better than the men you claim to want to destroy. There was a child at the table! I looked up to you. You were my hero, but right now…you disappoint me. The mother I remember would not need their daughter to explain that shooting Vadin in a room full of family leaders and a child is wrong.”
She had the decency to look down, ashamed.
“You’re right, that wasn’t my finest moment. That hadn’t been my plan, but when I saw him, I lost control. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for a lot of things. Hurting you and causing you pain is at the top of the list.”
I was reeling, but had to ask this.
“Why didn’t you go to Dad? Why didn’t you ask for help?”
“Because it was something that I had to do myself. If I’d dropped you off with your father and told him what I was planning, then he would’ve gotten involved.
He wouldn’t have been able to help himself.
It is his nature to protect and fight for those he loves.
He never would’ve let me do it on my own or played along with me being dead.
I had to deceive you both to make it look real. ”
I’d spent my whole life believing my mother was something pure, an angel frozen in memory, untouched by ugliness other than what was done to us. Now, I knew the truth. She was as tarnished by this world as anyone else. It hurt in ways grief never had.
She wasn’t a ghost. She was flesh and blood and choices. Her choices had carved scars into both of us. I understood her reasons, and grudgingly even respected some of them, but that made the betrayal sharper, like the slice of a knife.
Love didn’t disappear when trust fractured. It changed. I didn’t know if there was a future where we stood side by side as mother and daughter again. Maybe we would just learn to orbit each other carefully, as strangers bound by history neither of us could avoid.
All I knew was that whatever came next wouldn’t be simple, wouldn’t be clean, and it wouldn’t be the fairytale reunion from my dreams. I had no idea if loving her would ever feel safe again.
“I hear what you’re saying. You felt that the ends justified the means. I watched you die. I buried you. I grieved you. My father grieved you…again. You chose what worked best for you.”
I shook my head at her.
“You claim to love me, but I’m struggling to see that. You still haven’t told me why it was so important that you do this all by yourself. So, I’ll ask you again…why? Why do this at all?”
Mum stood and placed her hands on my shoulders.
“All I can say is, I’m sorry. I hope that one day you will find it in you to forgive me.”
“Are you leaving again?”
“No. I’m not going anywhere,” she said.
“Really? So, if Vadin takes off to the other side of the world…what then?”
She was quiet a beat too long, and I sighed.
“I see.”
I stepped back, and her hands fell to her sides.
“I need time to think about what you said, and I can’t be in the same house as you right now. I’m going back to Wayward.”
“Ren, please…”
“No. For four hundred and ninety-two days, I had no choice. You chose the silence. You chose the lie. You chose who and when I mourned. I survived because I had no other option. If there is any chance of repairing what you broke, it happens on my terms now. Not yours. Right now, I need space, and I need to learn who I am without grieving a ghost or reconciling a miracle. I will always love you, and I am grateful that you’re alive.
But the girl who needed you learned how to live without hope.
And now…the woman standing here doesn’t know how to trust someone who taught her how to grieve a mother who never actually left. ”
I didn’t wait for her to respond. Some wounds required no witnesses. I walked out before my resolve cracked and grief turned me back into someone smaller.
Whatever came next, I would face it without lies, ghosts, or surrendering myself again.
For the first time since she died—or hadn’t—I chose me.