Chapter 4 - THE WOMAN IN THE OLD PHOTOGRAPHRuth led me through the back door.
We ran through the garden with Noah crying against my chest.
Behind us, the front door burst open.
“Lydia!”
Adrian.
I stopped.
Ruth grabbed my arm.
“Don't.”
“He came alone.”
“You don't know that.”
I looked back.
Adrian stood in the doorway.
His expensive suit was covered in dirt.
He looked terrified.
Not angry.
Terrified.
“Lydia,” he said, “your mother is alive.”
I froze.
“You knew?”
“No.”
“Then how?”
He held out a photograph.
A woman stood beside a lake.
Older now.
Gray hair.
But unmistakably my mother.
On the back was an address.
A town in Vermont.
Adrian stepped closer.
“My mother found her first.”
“Why?”
“She wants something.”
“What?”
“You.”
The answer made no sense.
“Why would my mother want me now?”
“Because she believes Eleanor is about to kill you.”
I stared at him.
“And you?”
He lowered his head.
“I've spent the last three years believing my mother was protecting our family.”
“And now?”
“Now I think she destroyed it.”
We drove north.
For hours, nobody spoke.
When we finally reached the address, a woman opened the door.
I knew her before she said my name.
“Lydia.”
My knees nearly collapsed.
“Mom?”
She covered her mouth.
Then she started crying.
I stepped inside.
For the first time in twenty years, I was standing in front of the woman I'd buried.
She touched my face.
“You look just like your father.”
I pulled away.
“You let me believe you were dead.”
“I had no choice.”
“You had twenty years.”
“I was protecting you.”
“From Eleanor?”
She nodded.
Then she looked at Noah.
Her expression changed.
“She found him.”
“What?”
“She knows about his blood.”
My mother's hands began shaking.
“Your son carries the genetic marker your grandfather was looking for.”
I frowned.
“What marker?”
“The marker proving the Whitmore inheritance belongs to your family.”
Adrian stared at her.
“Then Noah is the heir?”
My mother looked at him.
“No.”
She looked at me.
“You are.”
The room went silent.
I felt the world shift beneath me.
“But the inheritance was settled years ago.”
“No.”
She opened a drawer and removed a sealed document.
“Your grandfather created a trust.”
She handed it to me.
The document contained one condition.
The estate would pass to the surviving descendant of Margaret Hale.
My name was written underneath.
I stared at it.
“Why did Eleanor want Noah's DNA?”
My mother whispered:
“Because she needed to know whether you had a child.”
“Why?”
“Because if you died without a biological heir, she would inherit everything.”
Adrian's face went white.
My mother looked at him.
“She has been planning this for years.”
Then the lights went out.
A car door slammed outside.
May you like
My mother whispered:
“They found us.”
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