Deep breath in. Exhale. Again.

Why couldn’t I see either one of them?

“Open your eyes, love.”

That’s why.I forced my eyes open to find two sets of eyes watching me with worry.

I swallowed hard. “Is it over?”

“We are just getting started,” Maxim muttered, pulling me hard into his chest. “You scared the living shit out of me.”

“It was nothing.”

“Doll, if that was nothing,” Daniel muttered, “we have to talk. Or have a permanent guy assigned to watch you. You were close to passing out.”

“It was nothing,” I repeated. I kept on my breathing exercise. “I remembered something,” I muttered.

Maxim reluctantly let go of me, his eyes searching out mine.

“Tell me.”

“After the accident, the first time I woke up,” I rasped, taking another deep breath in. “I was still in the car. In the back seat. My seatbelt was stuck. I wasn’t the one to drive that night.”

“Do you remember getting out of the car?” Maxim questioned.

“No.”

“Your mother has been apprehended,” Daniel added. “Maybe it is time we ask her.”

I glanced at Maxim. Part of me wanted to run away.

“It will provide closure.” Maxim was right, it would. But it would also prove one more time how little she cared about me.

“Okay.”

Daniel led the way towards a police van. When we got there, I looked at both men. “Inside?”

They both nodded. “Alone?” I swallowed hard at the thought of being alone with the person that left me to die and then blackmailed me for a decade.

“It will be just the three of us,” Maxim answered, squeezing my hand in assurance.

The van door opened and a police officer stepped out, exchanging a few words with Daniel. My eyes went over my mother’s face, noting delicate wrinkles that were evidence of her age. Despite them, she was still a beautiful woman. Our eyes locked.

“Hello, Mom.”

Was that how you greeted a mother after not seeing her for over twelve years?

“Hello, Layla.” Even her voice sounded the same.

I waited, for what I had no idea. She wouldn’t apologize. It would mean she knew she did wrong.

“You’ve grown up.” I frowned at such a stupid comment. Like she would have expected me to still be that sixteen-year-old girl.

“Yes.”

“How are your grandparents?”

“Arrested.”