Chapter 8 - THE CHEF WHO HAD BEEN LYING FOR TWENTY YEARS
Damian drew his gun.
Gerard didn't move.
Clara stepped between them.
“Wait.”
“Move.”
“No.”
His eyes flashed.
“Clara.”
“You said my mother saved Gerard's life. We haven't heard how.”
Gerard slowly raised his hands.
“She did.”
Damian's weapon remained trained on him.
“Explain the photograph.”
Gerard looked older than he had an hour earlier.
“Your mother called me to the country house.”
“Why?”
“She wanted someone who knew Joanne.”
“You were a dishwasher.”
“I was also Joanne's younger brother.”
Clara stared.
“What?”
Gerard looked at her.
“My name wasn't always Gerard Laurent.”
Her heart stopped.
“My name was Gerard Hughes.”
Clara took one step backward.
“You're my uncle?”
“Yes.”
“My mother told me her brother died.”
“She needed you to believe that.”
“Why?”
“To keep you from looking for me.”
Anger burned through her.
“All of you keep calling lies protection.”
Gerard lowered his eyes.
“You have every right to hate me.”
“I don't even know you.”
That hurt him.
Good.
Damian lowered the gun slightly but not completely.
“Why were you with my mother?”
“Elena was preparing to expose Anthony.”
“What happened?”
“I begged her not to.”
Damian's expression hardened.
“Why?”
“Because Anthony had Joanne.”
Clara stopped breathing.
“Mom?”
Gerard nodded.
Twenty years earlier, Joanne had escaped the estate but returned secretly because Elena promised to help clear her name.
Anthony discovered it.
He threatened both sisters—Elena's little sister and Joanne's young daughter.
Clara.
Gerard had been forced to carry messages between them.
Then Joanne fled permanently.
Gerard stayed behind.
“Why?”
“To watch Damian.”
Damian's face changed.
“Me?”
“Joanne made me promise.”
Gerard looked at Clara.
“Your mother believed Vincent and Anthony would eventually turn on each other. She thought Damian might survive only if someone inside the house remembered what they were capable of.”
For twenty years, Gerard had remained in the Costello kitchens.
Dishwasher.
Prep cook.
Chef.
Invisible in a different uniform.
“Why didn't you tell him?” Clara asked.
“Because I was afraid.”
The answer was painfully human.
Damian looked toward the photograph.
“What happened the night my mother died?”
Gerard swallowed.
“Anthony confronted her on the balcony.”
“Did he push her?”
“I don't know.”
“You were there.”
“I left to call Joanne.”
Damian's anger returned.
“When you came back?”
“Elena was on the ground.”
Silence.
Gerard wiped his face.
“But she wasn't alone.”
Damian went still.
“Who was with her?”
Gerard looked at him.
“Your father.”
Clara frowned.
“Vincent was alive twelve years ago?”
Damian's face drained of color.
“No.”
Vincent Costello was supposed to have died fourteen years earlier.
Two years before Elena fell.
Gerard whispered:
May you like
“Your father didn't die when everyone told you he did.”
And according to Gerard, Vincent Costello might still be alive.
