Who I Became (Who I Was Book 2) (16 page)

They shake their head and ask what they can do to help.

“Just be here for Mia when she gets out okay. Make sure she is treated by medical. She will fight it.” I look at Parker now, knowing he will listen. “Make her go anyway.”

He nods then we all go sit against one of the cars and alternate throwing the ball against another waiting for the time to be up.

It isn’t much longer but it feels like days.

“Wesson.” Chief yells. “It’s go time.

I nod then head over to him.

“Look I did as you asked even though I know I shouldn’t have.” He glances behind me and I turn to see what he is looking at… Vanessa, I am going to owe her one.

“Thank you sir, what did he say?”

“He said it was a good idea, you need to hear it too. He also said he wants Parker too.”

“What? NO?!”

“He said that he only wants to say what he has to say once and that the story is best coming from him. He said Parker is involved and needs to know.”

I grit my teeth and look out of the tent to where Parker and Braxton are talking together. I know Park will go no questions asked but Braxton is going to flip.

“Vanessa.” I call her over, I don’t know if it will work.

“Yeah?” She says but walks over to me not waiting for the answer.

“Look, Braxton is about to flip out if he finds out something. I need you to go talk to him, take him away for a few minutes.”

“I c-c-an’t do that.” She stuttered out, shocked.

“I don’t know how but you can, think of something that makes him walk away for a bit okay?”

She looks from me to Chief and after he nods agreeing with me, she takes a deep breath and turns on her heel, determination on her face. I smile as I watch her walk up to him with no sign of how nervous she is. She says something to him and he nods, turning to follow her. Wow that was easy. Parker glances in my direction confused and walks over.

“Is everything okay? Vanessa just said she needed Braxton to check for a bear that was sighted and was heading toward the house. They are going to make sure that they can shoo it away so Mia can get free, is she going to be okay?”

I laugh, joined in by Chief.

“She’s very creative.” He says making me laugh harder.

Parker watches us for a second until I calm down.  We need to get going before Braxton returns. I know he wouldn’t have let us go in without him. I don’t need another person to worry about in there. I push back the thought that it’s because I am unsure how Lil will react if we are both in there.

“Look Park, go get a jacket, Lucas has requested that we both go in with Lil.”

He doesn’t ask questions, just goes and grabs one from an officer standing nearby.

“I told him you guys would be unarmed, if he believes me that would be a miracle.  Be careful.”

I nod and cringe as I see Parker in a bullet proof vest.  He has grown on me and if he gets hurt it would kill Lillian.

“Ready?” Parker is bouncing on his feet as he joins up with us again.

Parker and I head down the path toward the house, we get about halfway there when we hear someone running up the other way.  I know it’s Mia and so does Park, we break out running after her.  We all stop as we come into view of each other, but Parker breaks away from the staring contest and goes up to her, I trickle behind him, unsure how she feels about me.

“Hey, you okay?” He grabs her arms and starts to look her over. Tears start in her eyes as she shakes her head yes. Then the unthinkable, she wraps her arms around him tightly and starts to cry into his shoulder.

“I didn’t want to leave her, I am glad he said you guys can be in there. That girl is her own worst enemy, it’s like she has a death wish.” She starts to laugh and I gasp.

“Did he hurt you?” I ask. She takes her head out of Parks shoulder and in her eyes I see my Mia, Little Mia.  She isn’t the girl who hated me when we last saw each other. She untangles herself from Parker and comes over to me. I am actually afraid she might hit me but she doesn’t. Instead, she gives me a hug too.  I hug her back so hard, never thinking I’d have my sister back.

“She’s amazing Wes, I can’t wait to meet my niece or nephew.  He won’t hurt her, but I’m glad you’re going to be with her. She is exhausted and you can tell a little weak.  She threw up this morning and last night but I made sure she ate and drank lots of water.”

I smile down at her and kissed her forehead before letting Parker give her one last hug, we need to get going. I now more than ever need to get to her.

“Listen Mia, you need to go and get checked out okay. You look better than the last time I saw you and you’re always beautiful but you need to make sure you are okay...” He stops looking at her, she looks at him with a look that says she can take care of herself. “For me?” He pleads and she nods. I knew Park had feelings for her but am happy to see them returned.

She starts to walk away and then turns around.

“See you boys in a bit with Lillian. Then we can start over!” She doesn’t wait for a reply she turns around and runs to safety.  I hope she is right.

We turn and head back down the rest of the hill.  The house comes into view and I start running again; I need to see her now or I may actually die.

“Stop.” I am just heading up the few steps up on to the porch when I see Lucas off to the side with a gun pointed at us. The need to get in there is so strong but I wait.  I am not stupid, I knew and still know he will want to make sure we aren’t armed. I put my hands in the air and Parker slides to a stop right behind me, following my lead, his hands go above his head.

Luke comes up next to us and motions for us to head inside. I instantly walk in and look around needing to see her. My breathing becomes more difficult. Until I can get a look at her, I won’t allow myself to breathe. I look everywhere that I can see from the entry way and can’t see her, panic starts rising each moment that I can’t see her.

“She’s locked upstairs. You can’t see her yet, so stop looking.  Turn around and put your hands on the wall.”

We both do as we are told and wait through the pat down.  I am anxious but know if I make any sudden movements it could harm her so I try to be patient.  He lets us move to sit in two chairs sitting in the middle of the room.  Brings back memories to them being tied up in the warehouse but we both sit when told, neither of us willing to risk Lillian’s safety.  He starts with tying me up first, smart move.  Then he goes to tie up Parker.

“Look, I told them I wouldn’t hurt any of you and I won’t.  I want you to believe me that Gessati had it in my head that you all deserved to die, but I am beginning to think that he wasn’t the best person to take advice from.  I am going to go get your precious Lillian now and you all three are going to listen to the story I have to tell.  I know you all feel betrayed but my story starts long before any of yours and we are more connected than you could ever imagine. He turns and heads up the stairs.

“Well, what are we going to do now that we are tied up? We can’t help her if he tries anything.” Parker starts but I am too busy rerunning what he just said through my mind over and over.  Something is up but I don’t think he is a physical threat to anyone of us. I lived with him and yes he lied to me apparently over and over but I can tell he isn’t right now.

“Wesson!” That voice, it’s of an angel! I turn to see her running down the stairs looking just as good as she did when she ran, maybe just a bit more tired than before.

She is just about to get to me when Lucas yells at her to stop. She stops dead in her tracks staring at me with tears in her eyes. She backs away.

“I told you not to touch them. I told you they were here and you go against my direction!”

“Sorry, I couldn’t help it. I’ll sit down over her okay? Please don’t hurt them.”

Fuck me! She sounds so scared. I watch as she sits on the couch in front of us and when he looks away, she mouths “I love you.” I say it out loud and proud.

“I fucking love you so much, Lil.”

“That’s enough.” He growls but she smiles so it was worth it.

“Now listen, I want this over as soon as possible.  I need to go get some stuff from the basement, Lillian you’ll come with me.”

“Okay.” She stands up then wobbles a little. I try to jump up only to be reminded I am confined to this fucking chair.

“Lillian are you okay?” I ask, almost begging for her to be okay. She nods then covers her mouth and runs, to what I assume is the bathroom.

“She does that a lot... looks like pregnancy doesn’t necessarily agree with her.”

My heart pounds as I wait for her to come out, finally she does and gives me a weak smile.

“It’s worth it.” She says and my heart goes crazy. I love her.

She follows him down and comes up carrying a dusty box then they repeat. Those better not be fucking heavy or I am going to be extremely pissed. As if she can feel my concern, which she normally can, she glances over at me and shakes her head letting me know she is okay.

I relax a little and wait for this fucking show to begin.

“What do you think he has to say?” Parker asks under his breath.

“I don’t know. He is definitely off the deep end. I just hope he tells us quickly, I need to get her out of here and checked on by a doctor.”

He nods and again we wait.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

LILLIAN

“Look, I’ll let you go to him after this last batch. You have a few seconds to hug them both then back to the couch.” Luke grumbles as he carries the last box up the stairs from the basement.

“Thank you.”

I have needed to actually feel him since I saw him. I need to actually, physically touch him to believe he is here.  Seeing Parker and Wesson here doesn’t fit into my plan, I don’t know if it’s better or worse with them here. We are back in the living room and Lucas leaves us alone to get drinks. He warns us that he can see us from the kitchen and will shoot us if I attempt to untie them.

I head over to Wesson and grab his face with both of my shaking hands, tears in my eyes as I give him a big kiss on the nose then a hug.  He can’t hug me back because of the ropes, so it isn’t enough to relax me since I don’t have his arms wrapped around me but it helps.

“Don’t you ever lie to me again. okay?” I whisper.

“I believe you lied, I …. omitted.” He says. There’s the jackass I fell in love with and I smile down at him.

“I won’t lie again either.”

He smiles now and tells me he loves me and our unborn child.

I go to Parker and give him a hug too. “Mia is great Parker.”

“I know.” He says, both of my boys are full of themselves in the worst possible moment but it lightens the mood and I laugh as Lucas heads back into the room.  Without the pretenses of me not remembering, I feel lighter. 

He hands me a glass of water before urging me to sit down. It is weird how on the spot he is about what I may need and how much he seems concerned. I told Mia she was crazy when she suggested that he was overly caring when it came to me but I see it.

Lucas clears his throat and sits on the end of the coffee table, his favorite seat when he has things he needs to talk about.

“Okay, I am going to start and say I am sorry for some of the stuff I have put you guys through. I should have protected you like I was sworn to do, but when you have someone close to you feeding you their version of the truth your entire life, it’s hard to know what is right. I know none of this makes sense but it will.”

“I did grow up with someone feeding me lies it seems.” Wesson says, meeting Lucas’s eyes.

He just nods and then heads over to one of the boxes.  He digs through and pulls out a picture frame. It’s covered in dust so he wipes it off before turning it around for all of us to see.

“These are my parents.” He says as if that means something to us.

It is a picture of a very young couple. It is an old photograph and has faded some but I look at them closely, each one looking eerily familiar.  I look at them over and over, knowing that I know them but unable to place where I have seen them before.

“Who are they?” I ask.

“I’ll tell you in a minute.” He places the photo on the table, standing it up so we are able to look at them while he continues to tell his story.

“They were destined to be together and even loved each other in the beginning.  They were paired from birth but even if they weren’t, they would have been together. They started out so young and got pregnant with me and my brother at such a young age, I don’t know if things would have been the same if they were older.”

Brother? I look at Wesson to see if he knew of any brother and he shakes his head. Lucas goes back to the boxes and pulls out another picture, almost as old as the last and equally dusty.  He wipes it off and just like the last picture, he holds it up so we can see it before putting it down on the table next to the other picture.  This picture had two babies in it, they are clearly twins and not but a few months old.

“A twin?” I ask maybe this isn’t Lucas after all, maybe this is his twin, it would make sense, he looks like my Lucas but doesn’t act like the Lucas I know.

Lucas nods then walks over to boxes again pulling out another photo. He holds it up and shows a picture of a casket, obviously made for a small child. My heart breaks. Tears well up in my eyes. 

“He was only one when he died.”

“I am so sorry.” I say as tears freely fall down my face.

“I don’t need you to be, it wasn’t your fault. According to my mother, it was my father’s fault and after that, she couldn’t even look at me anymore so she left. Well she left as much as she could because you see, it’s hard to leave my family. She fled and started a new family. My father did too; however, he was able to still take care of me, he didn’t just leave me like I meant nothing.  It was hard not to trust everything he told me at that point. I owed him, or at least he kept telling me that I did anyway.”              

I nod wide eyed, afraid for him to bring out any more photos.  He sits down again, this time on the chair on the other side of the living room.  He leans forward and pinches the bridge of his nose and closes his eyes.  I turn to look at Park and Wes and see they are just as confused as I am.

“It wasn’t supposed to be like this.  My stepmother died you see and my real mother could have put her killer behind bars but instead set her free.  My father felt that she did that because of him.  See he let her go even though he never stopped loving her, he didn’t know why but he needed her to be happy.  My brother’s death was an accident but it was one she could never get over and forgive him.”

He goes back and pulls out some more photos but continues to talk, facing them against him until he is ready for us to see what is in them. I don’t know that I want to know.

“He was pissed, he couldn’t let her get away with this anymore. Why did she get to leave him and move on and then ruin his life again? He was now not only mourning the loss of his son but now his wife.  He had another son and daughter at this point and wanted revenge for them even though they were small at the time and realistically would probably never understand.”

He stops and closes his eyes again trying to compose himself.  He looks up at the roof and then locks eyes with me before continuing.

“I hated my mother’s other children so when I was ordered to take out their father, an eye for an eye, you know I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t care what happened to them, how dare she love them more than she loved me.”

I actually start to feel bad for him. My heart aching for Lucas as a boy. The life he must have lived. I am scared shitless at this point for what he is going to say next. The realization starting to settle in my stomach.

“I didn’t know that seeing her again would mess me up so bad or it wouldn’t have been so messy.  My father came in to finish the job but it wasn’t as clean as it should have been.”

No, No, No… There is no way. I close my eyes tight wanting this nightmare to be over. Praying that what he says next isn’t what I think he is going to say.

“That’s right Lil, I know you know who they are now.” I open my eyes again and look at the picture, the first one he pulled out and now am not sure how I didn’t see it before. 

“What’s going on?” Both Park and Wesson ask at the same time but neither of us say anything for a while. I just stare at him as he stares at me.

“I don’t remember you being there until later.”

“No, I left before anything really happened. My father had to finish it himself which was perfect for me to be the first to respond.”

“Tell me what the fuck is going on here.” Wesson is getting angry and I don’t know how to tell him.

“These last few pictures are of the other halves of my family. It has my mother and father’s second families.” He turns them around and I am not surprised but the other two are, I don’t know how they didn’t pick it up before.

“What the fuck?” Wesson says, still confused. Parker just starts to shake his head.

“My mother and Gessati.” I say a matter of fact and Wesson locks eyes with me. It all is starting to settle with him.

“So, you are our brother?” Parker says.

“Half, but yes that is true.”

“But you raised me.” Wesson’s turn to ask questions.

“I did because when our mother died it set it all in motion. I was already in the police force and not completely associated with the Gessati name, just his puppet.”

“I don’t understand. Why did you do this to us? We are your flesh and blood.” I ask.

“You are right, you don’t understand. You are what I was supposed to be. You had two loving parents, one of them was supposed to be mine. She loved you and was the perfect mother to you. My father, he told me that I was never good enough for her; I didn’t know what to do. That’s why I left as soon as I could to get out from under him and joined the police force. I wanted to prove to her I was more than just his son. He wouldn’t let me do that though-” He walks away, toward the door just to get some space from us.  I see something breaking in him and I am worried it could go bad. Worse than being held captive by the man who was supposed to be friend then turned enemy.  To learn that after he hurt you and sent you to your death, he is actually family.

I see Parker starting to get antsy. I don’t know what he is thinking but I think he might set off Lucas.

“I don’t believe it, not mom.  She would never have been with a guy like Gessati.”

A maniacal laugh started to bubble out of Lucas.

“Your mother was so far from perfect.”

“Our mother.” I interrupted. It makes sense, all of it.  It makes me understand why this is how my life turned up.  But I feel he should own her also.  He is in this as well.

He nods and walks back into the living room, sitting back down. 

“Look, our mother…” It’s choked almost forced but he says it.  I feel like this way he will come to terms with us being his siblings not just some kids who he has spent a good amount of his life trying to kill. “Our mother and my father well our father I guess.” He stops and looks at Wesson. This has turned so fucked up. “They were so young when they got together; I believe that they loved each other.  I understand why she left, I do, the lies he told me though, were what I lived for so long believing. It unfortunately doesn’t take much for anyone to believe they are worthless and to want to prove oneself to the only parent they had left.”

“What about our father?” I asked needing to know my whole early childhood wasn’t a total lie.

“He was as innocent as he could be.  He didn’t have any clue what he fell in love with.  Just because she tried to leave the business doesn’t mean they would let her.  They let her stray but always held tight to the leash.  After she settled down and started having more kids, they made her work for them, your father too because at that time he was too invested to be able to get out.  He wasn’t born into it but he was stuck in it.  He never met Gessati until the night-“ He paused taking a deep breath. I can tell he regrets some of the things now and I think having him talk it out will help him forgive himself.  I know this won’t end the way he wants it to, it never does but I hope he can be at peace with himself. “He knew that they worked for the mob but he thought they were a lot further out of the loop then they were.  They wanted out and pleaded once Lil was born but it would never have worked.  So they did their own revenge- They let Wesson’s mother’s murderer go free.”

I look at him and he looks back at me.  He still has the look of love and compassion but I can see the hurt there as well. 

“I love you.” I mouth.

“I love you too, always.” He mouths back.

We turn back to Lucas. I am afraid of anything else he could possibly have to say at this time but I want it to be over and done with. I want him to rip the band aid off and not pull it off gently. The sooner this family reunion is over the sooner we can get out of here.

“Why are you telling us this? I mean I am thankful that you did. I am happy to know why we were hunted like we were. I am happy to have answers but why tell us? You didn’t have to.”

“You’re right I didn’t, but I couldn’t have died with this sitting on my chest. I wasn’t going to say anything but then I heard about your babies.” He looks between me and Wesson and my heart breaks for the baby I’ll never get to know.  It was at the hand of his father. I don’t miss the irony that he killed one of his grandkids, also a twin.  I also didn’t miss the part that he mentioned he couldn’t die with this hanging over him. He knows as much as I do, he can demand all he wants but they won’t let him live, not with the crimes he has committed. “Those babies are just like me and my brother, but I want him to grow up and know his parent’s love him and that even though the rest of his family is shit, good can come from it.”

“Him?” I break tears streaming down my cheeks.

“Yeah, I am sure they were both boys.  A circle of life so to speak, only this time it gets to be done right.”

“Thank you.” I say, the tears not stopping. I get up and go over to him. I can see my boys stiffen behind me.  I turn to look at them, letting them know it’s okay.  He is harmless. I will be okay.

I reach him and he has his head buried in his hands. I have to crouch down in front of him. I can’t believe that I am comforting him but he is family, he had a rough go. Do I think he is innocent? No, people come from shitty families and turn into good people. I place my hand on his shoulder, he stiffens and looks up I see the tears in his eyes.