Chapter 5 - MY MOTHER'S SECOND LIFEBy sunrise, our birthday party had become national news.
Clips of my scars were everywhere.
So was the footage of Sienna collapsing.
So was my father's arrest.
The internet did what it always did.
It chose heroes.
Villains.
Victims.
Monsters.
All before breakfast.
Reporters crowded outside our gates.
Headlines called me THE SCARRED SISTER.
I hated it.
My scars were part of me.
They weren't my name.
Inside the estate, federal agents continued carrying boxes from my father's office.
Our mother sat at the kitchen table in the same cream gown she had worn to the party.
Sienna sat across from her.
Maya stood by the windows.
Nobody seemed ready to leave.
Agent Cho entered carrying a photograph.
He placed it in front of Mom.
It was a passport photo.
The woman looked eerily similar to her.
Not identical.
Same brown eyes.
Same narrow jaw.
Same dark hair.
Mom stared.
“Who is she?”
“We hoped you could tell us.”
“I've never seen her.”
The passport had been issued twelve years earlier.
Name:
ELENA MARIE STERLING
Same birth date as Mom.
Different identification number.
Cho said, “We believe your husband created a synthetic identity using portions of your records.”
“Why?”
“To move money.”
That seemed almost ordinary after everything else.
Then he added:
“The woman in the photograph entered Switzerland six times using your name.”
Mom looked up.
“And?”
“She traveled with Richard.”
My mother closed her eyes.
Sienna said, “Another mistress?”
Cho hesitated.
“We don't know.”
Maya looked at the photograph.
“I do.”
Everyone turned.
“You've seen her?”
Maya nodded.
“My mother called her Victoria.”
Cho leaned forward.
“Victoria what?”
“I don't know.”
“How do you know the name?”
“Because she came to our apartment when I was nine.”
Mom stared.
“What did she want?”
“She wanted files.”
Maya’s eyes hardened.
“She threatened my mother.”
Agent Cho asked, “What kind of threat?”
“She told Mom accidents happen to people who keep things they shouldn't.”
Silence.
I felt sick.
Cho asked, “Did your mother report it?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because two weeks later, someone broke into our apartment.”
Maya folded her arms.
“They didn't steal jewelry. They didn't steal cash. They took one laptop and six folders.”
“Did Victoria return?”
“Once.”
“When?”
“The day after my seventeenth birthday.”
“What did she say?”
Maya looked at me.
“She asked whether my mother had ever told me about Harbor Road.”
The kitchen became silent.
Cho said, “Maya, why wasn't that information in your original statement?”
“Because until tonight, I didn't know what Harbor Road meant.”
Cho nodded slowly.
“What did Claudia tell her?”
“My mother told her to get out.”
“What happened next?”
“Victoria laughed.”
Maya swallowed.
“She said Richard should have listened to her fourteen years earlier.”
Sienna whispered, “Fourteen?”
Maya shook her head.
“She said, ‘One ruined car would have solved everything.’”
I felt cold despite the morning sun.
“Fourteen years earlier from then would be around the time we were toddlers.”
Agent Cho’s expression sharpened.
“Did Claudia ever mention another accident?”
“No.”
Mom suddenly stood.
“There was one.”
We turned.
Her face had gone pale.
“When the twins were three.”
I had no memory of it.
“What accident?”
Mom gripped the table.
“Our brakes failed.”
Sienna stared at her.
“Again?”
“We were driving through Santa Barbara.”
“Were we in the car?”
“Yes.”
Mom's voice broke.
“All four of us.”
“What happened?”
“Richard was driving. We were coming down a hill when the brakes stopped responding.”
My skin prickled.
“How did we survive?”
“He used the emergency brake and put the car into a gravel runoff.”
Cho asked, “Was the failure investigated?”
“Richard told me it was.”
“Results?”
“Defective brake line.”
“Who repaired the car before the trip?”
Mom looked confused.
“Our mechanic.”
“Name?”
She thought.
“Samuel Pike.”
Agent Cho wrote it down.
Maya suddenly sat.
“My mother knew someone named Sam.”
“How?”
“She had a Christmas card from him.”
Cho looked at her.
“Do you still have it?”
“Probably.”
“What did it say?”
Maya closed her eyes, trying to remember.
“Something like, ‘You were right to leave. He knows.’”
The room changed.
My father’s crimes might have begun long before Harbor Road.
Agent Cho stepped aside to make calls.
Sienna looked at Mom.
“Why didn't you ever question Dad?”
Mom stared at her coffee.
“Because I loved him.”
Sienna shook her head.
“That doesn't explain it.”
“No.”
Mom looked twenty years older.
“I was afraid of losing everything.”
She gestured toward the mansion.
“This house. His name. The company. My friends.”
I asked, “So you let him control everything?”
“Yes.”
“And us?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“Yes.”
“Why did you let Sienna treat me the way she did?”
Mom couldn't answer.
I pushed.
“You knew I saved her.”
“Yes.”
“You knew I woke up screaming for months.”
“Yes.”
“You watched me stop swimming. Stop wearing shorts. Stop going to parties.”
“Avery—”
“And when Sienna mocked me, you told me to be the bigger person.”
Mom began crying.
“I thought telling her would destroy her.”
“So you let it destroy me.”
Sienna looked away.
Mom whispered, “Yes.”
The honesty surprised me.
No excuse.
No defense.
Just yes.
For some reason, that made it easier to breathe.
“I don't forgive you.”
Mom nodded.
“I know.”
“I may someday.”
She cried harder.
“But not because you're my mother. And not because you cry.”
“I understand.”
I stood.
For the first time, I felt like the adult in the room.
Sienna followed me onto the terrace.
The party decorations remained.
Half-empty glasses.
Wilted flowers.
Abandoned shoes.
The giant EIGHTEEN AT LAST banner fluttered in the morning wind.
Sienna stared at it.
“I spent thirty thousand dollars on that sign.”
I looked at her.
“You're kidding.”
A tiny laugh escaped her.
Then mine.
It was inappropriate.
Absurd.
But after fourteen hours of horror, we laughed.
Not much.
Maybe five seconds.
Then Sienna’s smile disappeared.
“Did you really hate me?”
I leaned against the railing.
“Sometimes.”
“What about now?”
“I don't know you now.”
She nodded.
“That makes sense.”
She looked toward the ocean.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Yes.”
“Why did you save me?”
I stared at her.
“What?”
“That night.”
Her voice shook.
“You could have waited for firefighters.”
“No.”
“You could have gotten yourself killed.”
“I almost did.”
“So why?”
I looked at my twin sister.
For years, I had imagined delivering some powerful answer if she ever learned the truth.
Because I loved you.
Because we're twins.
Because I couldn't live without you.
The real answer was simpler.
“You screamed my name.”
Sienna’s eyes filled.
“I remember.”
I froze.
“What?”
“Not everything.”
She pressed her hand against her temple.
“But I remember being upside down.”
The crash had rolled the car halfway onto its side.
“I remember smoke.”
She took a shaky breath.
“And I remember screaming for you.”
I had never known.
“You came.”
“Yes.”
“You always came.”
She started crying.
“I stopped coming after that.”
I didn't understand.
“You were the one in the hospital.”
“No.”
She shook her head.
“I mean after.”
“When people started treating you differently.”
“When I became popular.”
“When I figured out everyone laughed if I made you the joke.”
She looked ashamed.
“I stopped being your sister.”
I said nothing.
“I can't undo that.”
“No.”
“But I can stop doing it.”
“Yes.”
She wiped her eyes.
“I'll start there.”
A black SUV pulled into the driveway.
Agent Cho came outside.
With him was a thin man in his late sixties.
White beard.
Work jacket.
Mom saw him through the doors and screamed.
Not in fear.
Recognition.
“Samuel?”
The man looked at her.
“Hello, Elena.”
Samuel Pike.
Our old mechanic.
The man connected to the first brake failure.
Mom rushed outside.
“I thought you moved to Oregon.”
“I did.”
Agent Cho said, “Mr. Pike contacted our field office after seeing last night's footage.”
Samuel looked at Sienna.
Then at me.
His eyes settled on my scars.
His face twisted with guilt.
“Oh, kid.”
I knew before he spoke.
He had something to do with Harbor Road.
Sienna knew too.
“What did my father make you do?”
Samuel shook his head.
“Nothing.”
Then he looked directly at us.
“Your father didn't sabotage the brakes.”
For one second, relief passed across Sienna’s face.
May you like
Then Samuel finished.
“Victoria did.”
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