Chapter 5 - THE LETTER SHE NEVER GAVE ME
“She'd found proof the fire was deliberately started.”
Dominic looked at June.
“What proof?”
She wiped her face.
“I don't know.”
“Did she describe it?”
“She said it concerned a property transfer made before the fire.”
Dominic glanced at the corporate filing.
“The business records?”
June nodded.
“She said the same people were still using those properties to make money.”
Detective Reyes leaned forward.
“Mrs. Sullivan, do you still have the letter?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“In a small tin box at my house.”
I almost laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because I'd seen that tin box a hundred times.
It lived in the bottom drawer of Mom's bedroom dresser.
Inside were Christmas cards, old receipts, photographs, and the adoption papers she was so proud of.
I'd helped her organize it after her hip surgery.
And I hadn't known my birth mother's words were sitting among those ordinary things.
“Why didn't you show me?” I asked.
June looked at me.
“Maggie, I was afraid.”
“You've said that.”
“I know.”
Her voice broke.
“But I'm trying to tell you the truth now.”
I looked away.
Dominic spoke gently.
“June, did Evelyn mention Victor Rourke?”
She nodded.
“She said he had been watching the people connected to Salvatore.”
“What people?”
“Old employees. Their families. Anyone who knew how the business operated.”
Dominic's expression hardened.
“Did she say Rourke was responsible for the fire?”
“No. She said she suspected him.”
Detective Reyes wrote something down.
“That's a useful distinction.”
June nodded.
“Evelyn was careful. She said she wanted to prove what happened before she approached her children.”
I turned sharply.
“Children?”
June looked at me.
“She mentioned both of you.”
Dominic went still.
“She knew I was alive?”
“Yes.”
He stared at her.
For thirty-one years, he'd believed his mother had either died or deliberately abandoned him.
Now he was hearing that she'd known where he was.
That she had thought about him.
And that she'd been trying to find a way back.
“Why didn't she come to me?” he asked.
June looked helpless.
“She said she couldn't risk being recognized before she understood who had betrayed your father.”
Dominic lowered his head.
“She could've called.”
“She was afraid Rourke would find Maggie.”
“But Maggie was already safe with you.”
June looked at me.
“That's what I thought.”
I felt something painful twist inside my chest.
All these years, everyone had been trying to protect me.
And somehow, all that protection had left me knowing nothing about my own life.
“Mom,” I said quietly, “you still should've told me.”
She nodded.
“I know.”
“Did you really think I wouldn't want to meet her?”
June began crying.
“No.”
That answer hurt more than a lie.
She looked directly at me.
“I thought you would want her so badly that you might leave me behind.”
I stared.
“Mom.”
“I know it's terrible.”
She swallowed.
“I'm not proud of it.”
For the first time, I saw how fear had changed her.
She had raised me through every difficult year.
She'd worked nights.
Missed meals.
Worn the same winter coat for nearly a decade so I could have new school shoes.
She was my mother.
But somewhere inside, she'd remained frightened that the little girl she'd taken in would someday decide the woman who gave birth to her mattered more.
I wanted to comfort her.
I couldn't.
Not yet.
“Did you tell Evelyn you were afraid?” I asked.
June shook her head.
“I told her to stay away.”
The words settled between us.
Then Dominic spoke.
“June, I'm not going to tell you that was right.”
She nodded.
“But I don't think Evelyn would've wanted you punished for being frightened.”
June looked at him.
“How can you know that?”
“Because she left Maggie with you.”
He paused.
“She trusted you with the most important thing she had.”
June began crying harder.
Detective Reyes asked whether she could arrange to collect the letter as evidence.
June agreed immediately.
She also consented to the police reviewing her adoption records.
“I don't want any more secrets,” she whispered.
Then the medical team began preparing her wheelchair for transport.
I stepped aside to let them work.
Dominic approached me.
“You don't have to forgive her tonight.”
I stared at the floor.
“I don't even know what I feel.”
“That's understandable.”
“I love her.”
“I know.”
“And I'm so angry.”
“You're allowed to be both.”
I looked up.
His eyes were red.
“You're angry, too.”
He nodded.
“At a lot of people.”
“Your uncle?”
“Maybe.”
“Your mother?”
He took a long breath.
“I'm trying not to be.”
“Why?”
“Because I don't know what she was forced to choose.”
I studied him.
For someone whose reputation terrified half of Chicago, he was trying remarkably hard not to let anger decide everything.
Leo approached quietly.
“Boss, the detectives found something in the care center's records.”
Dominic turned.
“What?”
“They confirmed that Evelyn Mercer entered Willow Gardens three nights ago as a visitor.”
My heart began pounding.
“Was Mom with her?”
“According to the visitor log, yes.”
“Then what happened?”
Leo looked at Detective Reyes.
She nodded for him to continue with the information investigators had authorized him to share.
“There was a disagreement near the administrative offices.”
“What kind of disagreement?”
“We don't know yet. But an employee documented that Evelyn asked to speak with Robert Vance.”
Dominic's jaw tightened.
“Did Vance see her?”
“Yes.”
I gripped the back of a chair.
“Then he knew who she was.”
Leo hesitated.
“The employee also noted that Vance escorted Evelyn toward the private offices. There's no recorded exit.”
I felt sick.
“What happened to her?”
Detective Reyes answered carefully.
“We're investigating that.”
Then Leo placed a copy of the visitor entry on the table.
There was a small handwritten note beside Evelyn's name.
I leaned closer.
The handwriting was hurried.
But the words were clear.
Must speak to Vance about the 1995 transfer before he destroys the remaining records.
Dominic stared at the note.
Then he looked toward the business filing.
The company.
The fire.
The woman who had spent thirty-one years trying to find her children.
And the care center where she had disappeared.
I thought the document had given us our first real answer.
Then Detective Reyes pointed to the date of the original property transfer.
October 14, 1995.
Dominic went pale.
“My father died October sixteenth.”
The detective nodded.
“The transfer was submitted two days before the fire.”
Dominic stared at the signature beneath it.
“Then my father might have discovered what they were doing.”
May you like
He looked at Leo.
“And someone had two days to make sure he couldn't stop them.”
