"I know why you were kidnapped."
"I know why Grandmother took away."
Adam and lanie froze, their words hanging in the air. Their eyes t, the sudden realisation flashing between them like an unspoken question.
Without thinking, lanie grabbed Adam’s arm and pulled him away from the balcony. His voice followed, quick and sharp. "You know why your grandmother took you away?"
She nodded once, not trusting her voice yet. Then, without a word, she reached into her bag and pulled out her phone. "Here. Look at this."
Adam took it from her, his gaze narrowing as he studied the image. A flicker of surprise passed over his face. "So... this is your mother?"
lanie’s eyes widened. "How did you guess that so quickly?" It had taken her a good few hours of staring at the picture to co to that realisation!
Adam reached into his coat pocket and took out the diary she had given him. He placed it on the table between them. "We should have seen this earlier. It would have saved us from a lot of misunderstandings. It would have sorted out many things. I’m just glad that I read it before it was too late."
She wrote about the truth. Marianne Thomas is not your mother."
lanie blinked and then felt her heart ache. Even though she had yet to have accepted Marianne as her mother, she had been happy to have one. It seed her happiness had been premature.. "So it is true?"
Adam nodded, and opened a page to the diary, I didn’t read the entire diary. But your grandmother started writing it after your mother fell sick. I think... Here, she has ntioned, Marianne used to be your mother’s nurse. Your mother was diagnosed with cancer soon after lody was born. Marianne ca to take care of her. She took care of her like a younger sister and Marianne’s bright personality always gave your mother hope and comfort."
"By the ti your mother passed away, Marianne had been in the house for a while. Your mother was called lrose.. Both your nas co from hers... Richard Thomas and lrose were deeply in love. So, lrose was worried that her being gone from the world would leave him alone. So, your mother asked your father to marry Marianne so that you and lody would have soone to take care of you and he would have a partner."
lanie looked down at the diary and rubbed her hands over the page. "Your grandmother agreed at the ti. She did not like the idea, but she accepted it because her only daughter had chosen Marianne herself."
lanie frowned. What did this an? While thinking in the afternoon, she had thought that maybe her father had cheated on her mother and that was why her grandmother had taken her away.
lanie’s frowned and as she wondered the question,her voice was low. "Then why did she take away?"
Adam’s tone turned heavier, and he turned the page. "One day she saw sothing Marianne did to you. She hasn’t ntioned the details here but from her tone, I think it made her quite angry... and suspicious of Marianne She wrote that she started investigating and confronted them. Marianne denied everything. Your grandmother beca worried about your safety. That is when she decided to take you away."
lanie slowly opened the diary. She saw her grandmother’s handwriting on the first page. Adam leaned back and let her read.
"I did not want to accept another woman in my daughter’s place, but she asked to. She said she trusted Marianne. She said she was dying and wanted the girls to have a mother’s care. I agreed because it was her last wish."
lanie turned the page.
"After she passed, I tried to believe that Marianne would be good to them. For a while, I thought she was. But the day I saw her with lanie, I knew I had been wrong. My daughter’s trust had been misplaced. I confronted her, but she refused to admit it. I could not leave lanie there. I feared what would happen if I did."
"You even had panic attacks at the ti. Your grandmother wrote that the first ti she saw it happen, she knew sothing was deeply wrong. She didn’t trust Marianne’s explanations. She said she could see fear in your eyes that no child should have."
lanie swallowed, the faint mory tugging at her, blurry and unsettling.
Adam went on, turning the page so she could see for herself. "Here- she wrote that it was that panic attack which made her decide she couldn’t wait any longer. She started making plans to take you away. She said she knew it would an being hunted, judged, and called a criminal, but she would rather face all of that than leave you where you were."
lanie’s gaze slid over the neat handwriting and she closed her eyes, "Once I took her, she never had another panic attack. Not once. I believe this is proof that I did the right thing. And I would never regret it... Now, the only regret is not being able to bring lody over. I tried.. God I tried to save lody from Marianne, but failed."
lanie clenched her hands and closed the diary. If Marianne had done sothing once, she could do it again, and the danger might not be aid at her alone this ti. "So, Marianne is indeed involved in all this. But the problem is we need to find what she did to ...that caused all this. And what she is planning now..."
Adam nodded and then sighed slowly," There is sothing else also."
"What?"
"If Marianne was the reason for your panic attacks then why did you have them when you saw Richard. And not Marianne."
lanie stilled. This was indeed a question that they would have to look for answers for.. The only problem? They had no idea where to look for answers.
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