“I’m sure he did,” Rachelle replied. “At one point, Joel became very involved in genealogy. He’d even mentioned to Grant that the company should gear some of their funds toward a genetics program.”
“Tessa, you’re sure Joel never told you this? Any of it, the genealogy, his interest in the subject?” Lee questioned.
“I would have remembered. I had identical twins, so it was a topic he and I discussed quite often, as you can imagine. He never even hinted that his great-grandfather was a twin, let alone an identical twin.”
Tessa was beginning to wonder if she had really known her husband at all.
Chapter 26
Sam looked at Tessa, and she smiled even though she wanted to run out of the room and scream until she could no longer talk. To run as fast as she could and go as far away as humanly possible. Hundreds of images assaulted her, and she could not stop them from overwhelming her.
“Do you need a minute, Tess?” Sam asked. “You don’t look too hot right now.”
That comment brought her front and center to the present. “Thanks, I’m okay.” She wasn’t and she knew that Sam knew it, but she had to get through this because, she realized, she did not want to go back to prison. No matter how much she told herself that it didn’t matter where she lived, now it did. Now she had a reason to go on. A reason that could bring her happiness if she allowed it, and right then and there, she knew that she would, and she would do whatever was necessary to stay out of prison. Legally. She could no more hunt Liam down and kill him than she could sit in this room now and slaughter Rachelle and Michael Chen. The thought was so far off that, for a second, she wondered if she had lost her mind, albeit, temporarily. Hunting down Liam Jamison like he was an animal would not bring back her daughters. Or Joel. And if Joel was alive, she would tell him that she thought he was a horrible husband and that he should have spent more time with Poppy and Piper. All these were just what-ifs, hypotheticals that would not amount to a hill of beans.
Though she needed much more than a minute, she kept that to herself. “No, I’m okay.” Right.
“I can’t believe Joel didn’t tell you this,” Rachelle said, her eyes filling up with tears.
She sounded truly surprised. Tessa was beginning to have a hard time believing that the woman was acting. She seemed to be genuinely sad. Grief-stricken, in fact.
“While I can’t recall the exact time when Grant told me, I do know that he did. There wasn’t much that Grant didn’t talk about. He was a talker, and I enjoyed his stories. I encouraged him to write them down, but he never had time. He knew quite a bit about his family, and Lois’s family, too, what there was of it anyway. Poor woman.”
“Who is Lois?” Tessa asked, not caring that she was interrupting Rachelle’s story.
All eyes turned to her. She began to feel like a pinned butterfly on a board. “What?” she asked. She hated this, wished she had never agreed to meet Rachelle here in this office, where there was no place to run and hide. She should’ve made them come to the house; at least there, she could run and hide.
“Darlene, we’re finished here. You can stop. Michael, are you good with this?” Lee asked. “It seems pretty obvious that Tessa knows nothing, as you can see. I think Joel blindsided her.”
“I do see where you’re headed, and for once, we’re on the same page. As soon as you have hard evidence, DNA, I’ll go to Judge Crider,” Chen said.
Darlene closed her machine and folded it into a small case. “Am I dismissed?” she asked sweetly.
“Shit, Darlene, you can do whatever you want,” Lee said.
Tessa was surprised at his use of profanity in this setting. “Will someone tell me what I’m missing here because I am completely clueless,” she asked the room in general. “What is going on?”
“Let me,” Rachelle said. “Tessa, Lois was Joel’s mother.”
Tessa nodded; she knew he had a mother. Of course he had a mother. Everyone has a mother. It’s where we all come from. “He never told me her name. He would get upset when I asked about her, so I stopped asking.”
“Of course he would be upset. When Lois died, Joel was at home with her. I think he was twelve. Grant said . . . never mind.” Rachelle stopped.
“Please, Rachelle. We’re way past keeping secrets from one another. What were you going to say?” Tessa pushed. “I need to hear whatever it is.”
“No one was ever charged in her death, but Grant always suspected that Joel knew more about his mother’s death than he told him.”
“What?” Saying that she was stunned would not even begin to describe what she was feeling. “What are you trying to say, Rachelle?”
“I guess it doesn’t really matter at this point since all of them are gone. I believe Liam is dead, too. He would never have run away, and if he had, he would find a way to contact me. He was my life. I know you all think he’s still out there somewhere, but he isn’t. Liam had many faults, but he was a good son and would never put me through this . . . hell that I have been through since he disappeared.
“Died. I suppose I should say it aloud. Makes it more real to me. I knew he’d never come back to me the day I found out about the girls. I hoped I was wrong, but a mother knows these things. Doesn’t like to admit them, but it’s been so very long ago. I just pray he’s in heaven with
