Chapter 3 - The Truth Hidden in the PhotographI didn’t sleep that night.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the woman on the roadside.
The flowers.
The photograph.
The tears.
Most of all, I saw the way Linda looked at her.
Not like she had seen a stranger.
Like she had seen a ghost.
At 3:17 in the morning, I walked downstairs.
The house was dark except for the kitchen light.
Dad was sitting at the table.
A cup of untouched coffee sat in front of him.
“You knew,” I said.
He looked up.
No surprise.
Like he had been waiting.
“I knew some things.”
I laughed quietly.
It wasn’t because anything was funny.
It was because I didn’t know what else to do.
“Some things?”
I put the letter on the table.
“Someone kept my mother’s letter from me for twenty years.”
Dad looked down.
“I thought I was protecting you.”
“From what?”
He didn’t answer.
“Dad.”
He rubbed his face.
“From the truth.”
I pulled out a chair.
“Then give me the truth.”
For a moment, he looked like the father I knew.
The man who taught me to ride a bike.
The man who stayed awake during my fever.
The man who came to every school event.
Then I remembered the envelope.
The years he took from me.
“Your mother discovered something about Linda’s family,” he said.
I frowned.
“Linda?”
He nodded.
“When your mother disappeared, she had found documents.”
“What documents?”
“Financial records. Legal papers.”
“That doesn’t explain anything.”
Dad looked toward the hallway.
“Linda’s father was involved in illegal business.”
I stared.
“My stepmother’s father?”
“Yes.”
“But what does that have to do with Mom?”
“She was helping someone expose him.”
A cold feeling moved through me.
“Who?”
Dad looked at me.
“Me.”
I stopped.
“You?”
He nodded.
“Your mother found out I was unknowingly involved in one of his companies. I thought it was legitimate. I was young. Stupid.”
“Then why didn’t she tell you?”
“She tried.”
His voice cracked.
“But before she could, someone threatened her.”
The kitchen suddenly felt too small.
“Who threatened her?”
Dad looked away.
“That’s what I never found out.”
A sound came from behind us.
Linda.
She was standing in the doorway.
And she looked exhausted.
“You know now,” she said.
Dad stood.
“Linda.”
“No. She deserves it.”
She walked into the kitchen.
For the first time, I saw her differently.
Not as my stepmother.
As someone carrying her own secrets.
“I knew your mother,” Linda said.
“I know.”
“No, Emma. You don’t.”
She sat across from me.
“Your mother was my best friend.”
My eyes widened.
“What?”
“She was the only person who believed I could become better than my family.”
I looked between them.
“Then why did you marry my dad?”
Linda’s eyes filled with tears.
“Because your mother asked me to.”
The words didn’t make sense.
“What?”
“She knew she might not come back.”
Dad looked down.
“She made me promise I would protect you.”
I felt like the floor disappeared.
“My mother asked you to marry my father?”
Linda nodded.
“She wanted someone she trusted near you.”
“But she left.”
Linda closed her eyes.
“No.”
She whispered the word.
“She was taken.”
The room went silent.
“What?”
Linda reached into her pocket.
She pulled out a small photograph.
The same photograph the woman on the road had been holding.
She placed it on the table.
My hands shook as I picked it up.
It showed my mother.
A younger Linda.
And a little girl.
Me.
On the back were words written in my mother’s handwriting.
For Emma. So she remembers where she came from.
I looked up.
“Where is my mother?”
Neither of them answered.
Then someone knocked on the front door.
Three slow knocks.
Everyone froze.
Dad’s face changed.
He whispered one name.
A name I had never heard before.
A name that made Linda start crying.
“Daniel.”
The door opened.
May you like
And the woman from the roadside stood there.
Holding the same white flowers.
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