Page 150 of Heartless Legacy

Is he serious? “What led you to this belief?” I ask, “Do you actually have any proof of her riding a bus or a train to LosAngeles, or any transportation system at all? And could you please explain to me why she’d go back to the very state she went through so much trouble to escape from?”

He looks unbothered by my suggestion that he’s an idiot. Alexz leans closer to the camera. “All good questions, Thea, but let’s work through this theory. Hailee realizes that people with ties to Canyon Falls were infiltrating her life, and is desperate to protect you.”

I add, “According to you, she pretends she’s drinking. Acting out. The people watching think she’s spiraling out of control, and so do the courts, when she drives drunk with me in the car. She’s arrested. Goes to treatment. I’m released into her custody and we move to Vegas.”

Stanford says, “Which is when she begins working as a server. She’s coming into contact with tourists from Los Angeles, and decides to sneak to Canyon Falls to keep an eye on things.”

I ask, “How does she get in and out of town without being seen?”

“That’s easy. By using the Santa Monica hiking trails.”

This is where it all falls apart. Shaking my head, I say, “That’s impossible. Those trails are gone. I was trying to map them out when I first got to town, and never found any.”

Alexz stares at me through the screen. His look just as potent as if he were here in the room, as he says, “Those trails were originally used by league members to sneak in and out of town on challenges. There were a lot of structures built over them as the landscape of the town changed. A few may still be accessible through hidden access points.”

“But how would mom know where the access points were? Women couldn’t join The League.”

“You’re right. They couldn’t, but they’ve always been assigned as companions and under the right circumstances, prospects are known to be… chatty.”

He’s right about that. I grimace, thinking about what mom might have done to get a prospect talking. “Any idea who her companion might have been?” I ask, swiveling back and forth in my chair. Whoever it is, I hate him already, because I know what he really planned was for him and his buddies to marry Moira, even though she wasn’t old enough.

“From what I’ve gathered, it was Evan Bishop.”

“Bishop?” I bang my knee against the table, turning back to the screen. “As in Wade Bishop’s father? The land developer?” I remember Wade bragging about that the night we met.

I turn this new information over in my head. Malcolm Cox, Felix Lazarro, and Evan Bishop. Malcolm would know the access points, but so would Evan, since his family was the one building all over town.

Can I imagine mom hiking into town on a secret mission? Hell yeah I can. We’ve hiked. It’s because of her I even have an interest in nature and exploring. What I can’t imagine is her sneaking into town after she went through so much trouble to escape.

Stanford says, “It’s safe to assume there may have been other people watching you through the years, but why didn’t they drag you and Hailee back to town?”

“Lack of opportunity?” I flick my eyes around the room, then back to Alexz on the screen. “Mom never stayed in one place for too long, and I think it might be kinda hard to kidnap someone from foster care. Plus, I stayed in trouble so much, I had a lot of court appearances and attention on me. They tend to issue warrants and manhunts for fugitives.”

I mull over the possibilities a little while longer, then ask, “If this theory is true, and I’m not saying it is, then explain to me why mom would go to Canyon Falls and not check in on Moira, who she adored? And who sent those people after us to begin with? The League was quite clear that they did not know whereshe was, which is why they ostracized Joshua. They thought he had something to do with mom’s disappearance, but they never tried to prove it.”

Alexz addresses Delta Team. “Those are very good questions. If Hailee made it to Canyon Falls, and it wasn’t to see her family, what was she doing there?”

One of the team members says, “Well, I can tell you sir, if I’m sneaking into some place, it’s to steal something.”

I nod my agreement. That’s pretty much the number one reason to sneak into a place you don’t belong. But mom couldn’t have been stealing anything of value. We didn’t have shit.

I think about what I know about my mother and what I’ve learned since moving to Canyon Falls. Mom was very protective of Moira and wanted to protect her from being forced into the life of a legacy wife. Mom didn’t want to be controlled either, and the plan was for all of us to be together.

What happened to make her change the plan? Why would I need to be a year older, and why did the fake birth certificate show her giving birth to a boy? Okay, that last part is easy enough. If she had a boy who died in childbirth, they wouldn’t be looking for her with a daughter.

Pretending to be a year older got me into school sooner, and being in foster care that last time forced the courts to end her parental rights. It’s that loophole that allowed me to be declared independent from Joshua’s control. I’m basically my own head of family. Did she know it would come to that?

I blurt out, “Mom’s got an uncle on her mother’s side that works in the archives.”

“Does she?” Alexz asks.

“You mean you didn’t know?” I smirk at him, kinda proud that I have information he doesn’t.

“No, I didn’t. From what I understand, Hailee’s mother left her in Joshua’s care. He’s the only relative I paid any attention to because that’s the person in power in The League.”

“Right.” Waving my hand, I say, “Women are invisible. They don’t exist. It’s all head of the bloodline men. All the time, and their decisions are final.”

Moira said Joshua was leaning towards changing the name on the marriage contracts, but mom was working on convincing him to keep it as it was. It was until after Moira got pregnant that she came up with this elaborate scheme to run away.

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