Page 4 of Twisted Hearts

“What?” she asked breathlessly. It sounded like a shout, and I flinched.

“Mom—”

“Go.”

“What?”

Her hands curled around my shoulders, and she gripped me so hard I shook from it. “Go. Now. You are not doing this.”

My mom, who had turned meek years before, had never stood so strong. I was struck by the force of her words, the weight behind them, knowing the risk.

“But Dad—”

“No.” Her eyes were cobalt again, shining with tears and wet. “I have been opposed to this. I knew…I knew something wasn’t right with you two, but Daniel’s family is so damn powerful and your dad is in such trouble…” She breathed, three deep inhales and exhales as I stood like a statue in front of her.

Go, she’d said. I could do this. Truly.

“What kind of trouble?” He was the mayor’s financial manager—how much trouble could he be in that would force him to agree to this while saying he was doing it to protect me?

My head spun from the confusion of it all.

“It doesn’t matter, but I can’t…I will not allow what’s become of me to touch you in any way. I want you to leave. Run. I will help in any way when I can, but it might be a while…”

She squeezed her eyes closed and left me breathless. This was my moment.

My chance.

“I have a rental in the parking lot, and some money set aside,” I whispered, my voice coated with knives.

Her eyes jumped open and went wide. Her shoulders fell as a forceful breath rushed from her. “You planned this.”

“In case I decided to. I didn’t know…” I kept waffling because my dad wasn’t the best dad, but he was mine and wasn’t the worst either. The Johanssens, though? They were pure evil.

She swallowed back her tears and licked her soft, pink-painted lips. “I will not let this man destroy you. I have stood quiet long enough, but this…this will not ever happen again, and it stabs me straight in the heart that this happened to you.”

“Mom.” I lost it then, tears falling down my professionally done face. “I love you.”

“I know.” She yanked me into a hug and held me tight, so tight I memorized her gardenia-scented perfume and the feel of her soft skin as if it’d be the last time I saw her. “I love you too, and I will not allow you to be hurt further, to endure…to becomeme,” she said, and a strangled sound slipped from my throat.

She understood.God.What would she have done had I told her the truth earlier? How much pain and fear could I have been saved from? It didn’t matter now, but the realization that I hadn’t given my mom enough credit made a pain pinch in my chest.

“I have a place to go.”

She paused then, still holding me with arms that trembled but had never shown so much strength. “You’re right to do it. Go. I’ll hold everyone off as long as I can, but…will you call me?”

“I will. But—”

“When you can. That’s all I ask.”

Maybe my mom hadn’t turned weak. Maybe she’d been biding her time to show her strength.

I thanked the heavens it was happening now.

“You sure?”

“It’s time for him to clean up his own messes, not pawn it off on the innocent. Go, Adrianna, and don’t look back.”

She stepped back then, and her hands went to my hair. Two quick tugs and my veil softly floated to the floor between us. She reached into the clutch she’d dropped onto a chair after she entered and dug into it. “Eight hundred dollars. It’s all I have on me, tips for the photographer and caterer and whatnot, but take it.”

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