Chapter 12 - THOMAS TELLS THE TRUTH
Ethan hit Thomas before anyone could stop him.
Thomas went down in the mud.
“You gave her our location?”
“I didn’t know she’d take Lily!”
Ethan grabbed him again.
Police pulled them apart.
“You knew she was dangerous!”
“She said she wanted to apologize!”
“You believed that?”
“No!”
“Then why?”
Thomas shouted back:
“Because she paid me!”
Silence.
Even the rain seemed quieter.
Thomas wiped his mouth.
“I owed people money.”
Ethan stared at him.
“So you sold us.”
“I gave her the hotel.”
“And Nora’s house?”
Thomas looked away.
Ethan understood.
“You followed us.”
“I’m sorry.”
Claire stood beneath the porch awning, Lily against her chest.
“No,” she said.
Thomas looked at her.
“I am.”
“You’re sorry now.”
Her voice trembled.
“But you watched me in my own house.”
“I know.”
“You helped her build a case that I was crazy.”
“I didn’t know about the drugs.”
“You still helped.”
Thomas lowered his eyes.
“You’re right.”
Police arrested him for his role in the surveillance and abduction plan.
He didn’t resist.
As they placed him in the cruiser, Ethan walked over.
Thomas looked through the open door.
“I never wanted Lily hurt.”
“That doesn’t make you innocent.”
“I know.”
“Why did Dad protect you?”
Thomas swallowed.
“Because I protected Mom first.”
“What does that mean?”
“When I was twenty-three, I found Dad bleeding in the garage.”
Ethan stared.
“What?”
“Mom hit him with a bottle.”
“No.”
“Yeah.”
“You’re lying.”
“I wish.”
Thomas looked exhausted.
“She begged me not to tell anybody. Said Dad was going to leave her. Said the family would fall apart.”
Ethan remembered his father wearing sunglasses indoors one summer.
A “shop accident.”
That was the explanation.
Thomas continued.
“Years later, when I found the gambling transfers, she reminded me that I’d lied for her before.”
“And Dad?”
“He knew.”
“Why didn’t he tell me?”
“He was ashamed.”
Ethan looked toward the burning cabin.
“So everybody lied.”
Thomas nodded.
“That’s how she survived.”
“What?”
“She never needed everybody to believe her.”
Thomas leaned forward.
“She only needed each person to hide one thing.”
The cruiser door closed.
That sentence followed Ethan home.
Over the next three weeks, more things surfaced.
Old bank records.
Police reports that had never become charges.
Emails from Richard to Arthur Bell.
A former housekeeper who remembered Evelyn throwing plates.
A cousin who had stopped visiting after Evelyn slapped her during an argument.
Separate incidents.
Separate secrets.
One family myth.
Evelyn Mercer was difficult.
But she loved deeply.
The truth was uglier.
Evelyn loved people most when they obeyed.
One afternoon, Arthur Bell called again.
“There’s something else.”
Ethan almost laughed.
“Of course there is.”
“Your father left a second letter.”
“To me?”
“No.”
Arthur paused.
“To Claire.”
Claire looked up from across the room.
“What does it say?”
“I haven’t opened it.”
“Why now?”
“Richard instructed me to deliver it if Evelyn ever tried to take Lily.”
Claire went completely still.
The envelope arrived the next morning.
On the front, Richard had written:
May you like
FOR CLAIRE — WHEN YOU FINALLY SEE HER WITHOUT THE MASK.
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