Chapter 8 - The Daughter Eleanor Lost
Annie sat on the couch.
She couldn’t move.
She couldn’t speak.
“My mother didn’t die in an accident?”
Her voice was small.
Eleanor looked broken.
“No.”
Annie felt like the entire world shifted.
“Then what happened?”
Daniel looked at Eleanor.
She nodded.
It was time.
“Your mother, Claire, was brave.”
Eleanor wiped her tears.
“Too brave.”
“She found out things she was never supposed to know.”
Annie listened.
“About Daniel?”
Eleanor nodded.
“About people who wanted control.”
“About people who hurt others to get what they wanted.”
Annie looked at Daniel.
“Were you involved?”
Daniel didn’t answer immediately.
That silence hurt.
“I was part of that world,” he finally said.
“But I never wanted your mother hurt.”
Thomas stepped forward.
“Your mother tried to expose them.”
“And they stopped her.”
Annie’s eyes filled with tears.
“Who?”
Nobody answered.
Then Daniel looked at her.
“The same people who poisoned your grandmother.”
Annie stood.
“I want to know who.”
Daniel shook his head.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because once you know, you can’t go back.”
Annie looked at him.
“I already can’t go back.”
That sentence hit Daniel harder than he expected.
Because she sounded exactly like Eleanor.
The same courage.
The same stubborn kindness.
Suddenly Daniel’s phone rang.
He answered.
A few seconds later, his face changed.
“What happened?” Marcus asked.
Daniel looked at Annie.
“They found our location.”
Everyone moved.
“Where?”
Daniel slowly lowered the phone.
“The hospital.”
Annie froze.
“What?”
“The person who attacked me wasn’t trying to kill me.”
Daniel looked at Eleanor.
“They were trying to force me to reveal where you were.”
A terrible realization filled the room.
Someone had planned everything.
The collapse.
The attack.
The timing.
All of it.
And Annie wasn’t a random child who saved a stranger.
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She was the reason someone had been waiting thirty years.
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