Page 72 of Forged in Flames (Made of Steel 2)

With each word he spoke it felt like he had stabbed a knife in my heart and was slowly twisting it.

I shook my head. "I don't have any family left, though."

"Apparently you do."

"That's not possible." For a few seconds I thought my mother was alive. It almost felt like she was being taken away from me again.

"Liza is looking into it."

"But she looked just like my mom. She looks like me."

"We think that your mom probably had a sister. We don't know for sure."

"She didn't. She would have told me. My grandmother would have told me. There would have been pictures or other proof. She didn't have a sister. It's my mom. Sadie Davis is my mom!"

"Summer, it's not your mom." He said it sternly, like he was trying to shake me out of my hallucination. "Don's just trying to get into your head. He's trying to rattle you. She dyed her hair and is wearing colored contacts to get under your skin. You've seen the real her. She's not your mother," he repeated.

"What if you're wrong? What if it's her? What if she's in trouble?"

"That woman is not on our side."

"But..."

"She's counting down the days to your death!"

His words seemed to ring in my ears. Death. Death. Death.

"I thought you all agreed that I wasn't going to die?" I asked. "We've been acting like we're putting together a puzzle, not trying to save my life."

"Sheltering you from the truth isn't helping anyone. Two days, Summer. We have two days to put the pieces together."

I swallowed hard. "You think she's going to kill me? Even if she is related to me?"

"I think she's damn well going to try."

***

I stared down at the last page of the file. As soon as I had read the information about Julie I had freaked out. I hadn't even realized there was another page.

But it didn't make any sense. My mother didn't have a sister. I never once heard of an a

unt. And wouldn't my grandmother have talked about her? It was possible that she had a falling out with my family. I tapped my fingers against the glass table.

My grandmother was devastated after my mother died. If she had another kid, wouldn't she have reached out to her even if they were estranged? None of this made any sense. My fingers were making smudge marks on the glass. I quickly wiped them away with the hem of my shirt.

The whirring noise of the window opening made me turn my head.

I slammed the folder shut as V stepped inside. "We need to train," I said.

"Why aren't you in class?" he asked.

I stood up and walked over to him. "You need to teach me how to fight. I only have two days left."

"Sadie Davis is a trained sniper. You can't train for something you can't see."

I swallowed hard. "What...so there's no point?"

"We're going to figure out how to play up the new angle."

---