Chapter 8 - THE GIRL WHO CHANGED THE FAMILY
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Maya refused the private school.
She said it was “too shiny.”
That made my mother laugh for the first time in months.
So we found a small neighborhood school near the hospital.
Maya loved it.
She came home with drawings.
Spelling tests.
A paper crown.
She taped everything to the wall outside Clara's room.
The twins grew quickly.
Loud.
Healthy.
Spoiled.
My mother called them “the little generals.”
My father pretended not to enjoy it.
Clara changed too.
She had spent five years hiding.
Now she walked through Chicago without looking over her shoulder.
She enrolled in university.
Started studying medicine.
She said she wanted to build clinics for women who had nowhere else to go.
I helped.
Not because she was a Sterling.
Because she was my sister.
One evening, Maya found me in the library.
She climbed onto the sofa.
“Mr. Gabriel?”
“Yes?”
“Are you rich?”
I laughed.
“Very.”
“How rich?”
“Very.”
She thought about it.
“Do you have a swimming pool?”
“Yes.”
“Can it fit a boat?”
“Probably.”
She nodded thoughtfully.
Then she asked:
“Can you buy my mom a house?”
I smiled.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because she deserves one.”
Maya hugged me.
“You're nice.”
“I've been told I'm terrifying.”
She giggled.
“I don't believe it.”
Neither did I anymore.
Then the door opened.
Clara walked in holding an envelope.
“What is that?”
She handed it to me.
“It came from federal investigators.”
I opened it.
A final account had been discovered.
Not in my father's name.
Not my grandmother's.
Not Victor's.
Someone else.
The balance was enormous.
The account had been active for twenty years.
Monthly deposits.
No withdrawals.
The beneficiary was—
Maya.
I stared.
“What?”
Clara frowned.
“Why would someone set up a trust for Maya before she was born?”
I looked at the documents.
The account had been created eight years earlier.
The day Maya was born.
I stared at her.
“Who knew about her?”
“Only a few people.”
I read the signature.
My father's.
Then another.
My mother's.
And a third.
Lucille Sterling.
My grandmother.
Impossible.
She had wanted the children dead.
Yet she had secretly funded Maya.
Why?
A note was attached.
I read it.
The girl is not the key. She is the witness.
Clara looked at me.
“What does that mean?”
“I don't know.”
Then Maya walked closer.
She stared at the photograph inside the file.
Her face changed.
“I know him.”
I froze.
“You know who?”
She pointed to the photograph.
A man stood beside my grandmother.
Older.
Tall.
A scar across his cheek.
“That's the man who came to our apartment.”
My blood turned cold.
“What did he say?”
“He asked Mommy where the baby was.”
“Did you see him again?”
She nodded.
“When?”
“At the store.”
My stomach dropped.
“How long ago?”
Maya thought.
“Yesterday.”
I stood immediately.
“Where?”
She pointed at the window.
Across the street, a black sedan sat at the curb.
The headlights were off.
I ran toward the window.
The sedan pulled away.
My security team pursued.
But it disappeared into traffic.
I turned back.
Maya was crying.
I knelt.
“Don't be afraid.”
“Are they coming back?”
I looked at Clara.
Then at my nephews.
“Yes.”
“But you're here.”
I smiled.
“Yes.”
She whispered:
“Then I'm not scared.”
That night, I understood something.
May you like
The war wasn't completely over.
But this time, nobody in my family was alone.
