“No.”
He looked at her with hollow, broken eyes.
“I didn’t mean for it to go that far.”
Rachel let out a sob so raw I felt it in my chest.
“You told me Dad knew. You told me he was helping.”
“He was,” I said quietly, because now I understood.
All the pieces I had buried, all the things I had refused to connect, snapped into place with sickening clarity.
Fifteen years ago, I had not become pregnant because of some reckless mistake.
I had become pregnant after finding Rachel in the old storage building behind my father’s repair shop.
I had been the one who discovered the hidden room by accident.
Rachel had been weak, terrified, half-starved—but alive.
I had tried to get her out.
My father caught us before we reached the road.
He told me if I went to the police, Rachel would disappear forever.
He said Daniel Harper, a disgraced detective drowning in gambling debt, had been helping him move Rachel and keep people away.
He said no one would believe a pregnant seventeen-year-old over a decorated officer and a respected church deacon.
He said if I stayed quiet, Rachel would live.
Then one night, Daniel Harper vanished.
And my father told me Rachel had died during transit.
I had believed him.
Mostly.
But not enough to stay.
