Chapter 9 - I Followed the Missing Housekeeper to Baltimore—and Heard My Brother Call Another Woman Mom
Cedric wanted security around me.
I wanted answers.
We compromised badly.
Daniel drove. Cedric came with us. Meera sat beside me, holding the photograph of Nico.
In Baltimore, the bookstore owner recognized him.
"Quiet fellow," she said. "Always bought used maps."
She pointed us toward a small apartment above a bakery.
A woman answered the door.
Mariana.
I stared at her.
"You worked in Cedric's house."
"Because I was watching over you."
"For whom?"
She stepped aside.
Nico stood at the kitchen table.
My brother.
Alive.
For a moment I couldn't breathe.
Then he said, "Mom, who's there?"
He was speaking to Mariana.
I felt something inside me tear.
Mariana's eyes filled.
"She raised me after Elena disappeared," Nico explained, watching my face. "She told me the truth when I was old enough."
"You knew about me?"
"I knew they were using you as bait. I didn't know how to reach you without leading them here."
He stepped forward.
I recognized the scar above his eyebrow.
The years between us suddenly felt very small.
"Anna," he whispered.
I crossed the kitchen and held him so tightly he laughed through his tears.
He smelled like coffee and laundry soap.
He was real.
When I finally let go, Nico looked at Cedric.
"You brought him."
"He helped me find you."
"His father helped bury us."
Cedric said nothing.
Nico opened a drawer and produced a sealed envelope.
"Mom left this for you."
I took it.
Across the front, in my mother's handwriting, were the words:
TO ANNA, WHEN SHE CAN CHOOSE FOR HERSELF.
May you like
Inside was a letter.
And a photograph of my mother taken only six months earlier.
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