Chapter 7 - THE LIE THAT KEPT ME ALIVE
I couldn't look at Caleb.
Not after seeing him enter Evan's building on the night everything fell apart.
Tell me what happened, I signed.
His hands trembled.
Evan called me. He said Victor knew about our investigation.
I watched every movement.
When I arrived, his door was open. He was lying on the floor.
I swallowed hard.
Was he alive?
Caleb nodded.
He was conscious. He was trying to tell me something.
My knees weakened.
Caleb continued.
I called emergency services. I stayed with him until he told me to get help from outside.
He'd run downstairs, only to find the ambulance being delayed by men working for Victor.
By the time another crew reached Evan, it was too late.
“Why didn't you tell me?” I asked aloud.
Then I signed it.
Caleb's eyes filled.
Because Victor threatened you.
He took out his phone.
A photograph appeared on the screen.
It showed me leaving the hospital after Evan's death.
Someone had taken it from across the street.
Beneath the photograph was an old message.
One word to Hannah Mercer, and she joins her brother.
I stared at the screen.
For six years, Caleb had carried that threat.
But fear didn't erase the pain of being kept in the dark.
You should have told me, I signed.
I know.
You let me believe he died alone.
Caleb lowered his head.
I'm sorry.
I wanted to forgive him.
I also wanted to scream.
Instead, I stepped away.
“Everybody keeps saying they were protecting someone,” I whispered. “But nobody gave me a choice.”
Elena entered the library carrying Evan's storage drive.
“I found something in the encrypted files.”
We gathered around the computer.
A video opened.
Evan appeared on the screen, sitting at a small wooden table.
He looked healthy.
Alive.
He was wearing the blue sweater I'd bought him for Christmas.
My chest tightened so painfully that I had to sit down.
He began signing directly toward the camera.
Hannah, if you're watching this, something happened to me.
Tears blurred my vision.
I need you to know I wasn't trying to become a hero. I was trying to help someone find his mother.
Evan glanced toward someone outside the camera's view.
Then he signed something that made Elena freeze the recording.
May you like
The woman sitting beside me is Isabel Vale.
And when Elena resumed the video, Caleb's supposedly dead mother stepped into the frame.
