“Gone.” I shrug. “I confronted your father, and he was satisfied that she was useless.”

Tiana’s mouth drops open. “And also you believed him?”

“No. I knew he was mendacity, so I looked for her. However I discovered nothing. She had merely vanished. Once I spoke to my employer, I informed him that it had been taken care of as a result of it had. She was gone. And I had discovered a option to management your father regardless.”

“That is mindless.” She rubs her brow, trying defeated.

“It was not my obligation to make sense of issues. I used to be there to do a job.”

“Why ought to I consider you?” she asks. “You’ve lied to me, manipulated me, and used me. How can I belief you now?”

“As a result of your mom is alive.”

Tiana shoots upright, rising straight off the chair. Her eyes go large and a strangled gasp escapes her lips. The blood drains from her face straight away, as she shakes her head in disbelief.

“What?!” she blurts. “She- She- What?” She’s shaking her head, her eyes crammed with tears. “How might you already know that?”

“As a result of I discovered her,” I say merely.

“Don’t you fucking misinform me, you bastard!” Her chest heaves as she stares at me with eyes stuffed with tears.

“I’m not, Ptichka.” I hold my eyes locked with hers. “I do know that is necessary to you. So, I discovered her.” I purse my lips. Admitting this seems like a weak point, nevertheless it’s true. Her happiness warms some unusual a part of me that I believed was lengthy useless.

Her eyes are nonetheless locked with mine, large and incredulous. She shakes her head once more, then runs each her fingers by her hair in a gesture of agitation. I say nothing. Lastly, she drops her fingers, her arms hanging limply at her sides.

“I would like proof.”

“I perceive.” It doesn’t shock me. I might demand the identical factor.

“I wish to see her!” Her phrases come rapidly, her fingers fluttering collectively.

“Proper.” Once more, it doesn’t shock me. She seems to be round wildly as if I’ve her mom on name someplace. As a substitute, I attain into my jacket pocket and extract my cellphone. The factor has taken a number of knocks, and the display screen is cracked, nevertheless it powers to life after I swipe the display screen. Pulling up an app, I hand the gadget to her. She stares at it for a protracted second.

“Mother.” She lastly breathes the phrase out, her throat working as she seems to be at a photograph taken of her mom by considered one of Dima’s investigators.

“Preserve swiping. There’s extra.” I watch her face change by a myriad of expressions; confusion, sorrow, pleasure, and nostalgia. Extra tears effectively, and catch on her decrease lashes earlier than tumbling down her cheek. She wipes the streak of tears away with the again of her hand earlier than trying again up at me.

“It’s her,” she whispers. “It’s actually her. I keep in mind her… her smile. Her eyes. It’s her. My mom is alive.”

Chapter Seventeen

Tiana

I can’t consider my eyes.

The girl within the photographs is older. Her options are softened and lined by time, her darkish hair streaked grey. But it surely’s her. I’d know my mom wherever. She’s been alive all this time. All these years that I’ve thought she was useless, she was on the market.

I don’t know if that eases my ache or breaks my coronary heart.

Why did she depart us?

Why did she depart me?

I clutch a hand to my chest, not caring that I’m crying now. My coronary heart feels prefer it’s stopped after which began once more with a lurch, and now it’s racing. There’s a lump in my throat that I’ve to swallow down earlier than I communicate to Kirill once more.

“You discovered her,” I whisper. “She’s alive.”

“See?” He shrugs. “I might by no means misinform you, Tiana.” His darkish eyes are so intense they make my breath catch, and my cheeks develop heat.

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