CHAPTER EIGHTY-TWO

“Right here, Benjamín,” the voice said again, calmly.

Every line in her father’s face stiffened. It was as if he saw who was standing behind him in the reflection in Kate’s eyes.

Mercado took a step forward, into view. “Turn around, brother. Put the gun on the counter.”

Her father did as he was told. As he turned, the two brothers stood facing each other for the first time in twenty years.

“You wanted me, Benjamín.” Mercado smiled, the gun just hanging loosely at his side. “So here I am.”

“What are you going to do?” her father asked.

“I’m not going to shoot you, Ben, if that’s what you think. Your man outside is dead. Along with the others. There’s been enough killing, don’t you think? Sharon, Eleanor, my wife… Like you said, no more lying.”

“Then what do you want?” Her father eyed him balefully.

“What do I want?” Mercado’s gaze shifted toward Kate. “What I want is for Kate to hear.”

Mercado took a step closer, his gaze steady and penetrating. “What was Sharon going to tell her, Ben? It’s just the three of us now. What was it you didn’t want Kate to know?”

Raab’s eyes darted around. He moved toward Kate. She could see he was desperate. He might use her as a hostage. He would do anything now.

“You’re the one with the pendant, Oscar. You’re the one who seems to have truth on his side. And the gun.”

Then Mercado did something that shocked Kate. He put his gun on a stool nearby. He just stood there, hands empty.

“Now it’s only the truth, Ben. Tell her. What were you afraid she would find out? That’s all she wants to know.”

Kate could see that he wasn’t expecting to come out of this alive.

“Tell me what, Dad?”

Her father didn’t reply.

Mercado smiled. “No, I don’t think that even mattered to you, did it, Ben? Because it was never Sharon you were after, was it?” His eyes were firm yet calm. “Was it, brother? This is the time for truth, Ben. Tell her! She deserves to know.”

There was a haunting silence.

Kate was transfixed by Mercado’s gaze, unsure what she had just heard. Then suddenly it hit her. She turned back to her father.

“Me…?”

The word came out as more of a stammer. She stared at her father, trying to fight back her confusion.

“You were trying to kill me? Why?”

At that moment her father reached behind him, grabbing his gun. Mercado just stood there, staring back at him. He never made a move to defend himself.

Kate screamed as the gun went off, “No!”

The bullet struck Mercado in the right thigh. His knees buckled, and he went to the floor.

“Tell her, Ben. It was because it would hurt me-isn’t that right? That’s all you were ever trying to achieve. Because it would hurt me. Blood washes away blood, isn’t that the creed? So what was Sharon going to say? Go on, tell her, Ben. It’s time.”

Mercado looked up almost tenderly at Kate, who stood there mesmerized.

“Tell her about the pendant, Benjamín. It’s time. It’s true.…” He smiled at Kate as her father leveled the gun at him. “It does hold secrets, Kate. Your mother wanted you to have it one day… Didn’t she, Ben? Your mother, Kate…” He kept looking up at her, eyes glistening.

“It just wasn’t Sharon, child.”

CHAPTER EIGHTY-THREE

The emptiness Kate felt in the rush of that moment was like nothing she had ever felt before.

Did she hear it right?

For an instant she just fixed on Mercado. Then she looked down, in the silent manner in which a bomb victim looks down, numbed by the shock of concussion, staring at a limb suddenly not there, trying to comprehend if what had just happened was real.

“Tell her, Benjamín.” Mercado gazed up at him. “Tell her how you can hurt someone that is family. Something you pretend to love.”

Kate’s father pulled the trigger again. The gun flashed, hitting Mercado again, this time in the shoulder.

Kate lunged to stop him. “No, Daddy, no!”

Mercado keeled backward. He steadied himself with one hand. Kate pulled off her sweatshirt and wrapped it around him like a tourniquet.

“What is he talking about?” She turned to Mercado. “What do you mean about my mother?”

“She was a beautiful woman, wasn’t she, Ben? Of course, I didn’t have the life to raise a child properly, did I? I was going to prison. I was going to be away for a very long time. And, my wife, she was sick. Isn’t that right? Diabetes, wasn’t it?”

He looked softly at Kate. And she suddenly recalled how the first time they’d talked, in the park, he had spoken about a wife who’d died of diabetes many years before.

My mother…?

“I had to make a choice, didn’t I, Ben? How could I leave my child alone, without a mother…or a family?” He put his hand over Kate’s. It was cold. “And you were always the consummate family man, weren’t you, Benjamín?”

“In all regards.”

The muzzle flashed again, and Mercado rolled backward, grasping his side.

Kate realized she was watching her real father slowly being killed.

“I thought I did the right thing for you,” Mercado said to Kate. “And you were protected, all these years…”

“Until you started betraying our family,” Raab said. “Until you forgot who you were.”

“I had to make a choice.” Mercado looked toward Kate.

Raab pulled the hammer. “And so, brother, so do I!”

“No!” Kate lunged at him, catching his arm. He took her by the wrist as if she were a piece of wood and flung her aside. Kate fell against the lab counter, a tray of tubes crashing to the floor. She reached up to the counter and pulled herself up.

“I sent Greg.” Mercado looked at her. “Not to spy, child. To watch over you. To protect you, Catarina. Now you know why.”

Kate nodded. Suddenly her gaze shifted to the counter.

“See, Benjamín, look at what you’ve lost,” Mercado said. “Everything in your heart. Look at her… Was it worth it? This oath of yours. Where can you go now?”

“I can go back,” Raab said, placing the muzzle of the gun in front of the old man’s eyes. “But you, brother, your time is up. You have nowhere to go but hell.”

“No, Daddy,” Kate said firmly.

It made him turn. Her gun was extended. Directly at him. She shook her head. “Not just yet.”

CHAPTER EIGHTY-FOUR

Raab held the gun at his brother’s head, his finger on the trigger. And Kate steadied her gun with both hands. She had no idea what she would do.

Then, slowly, Raab released the hammer and lowered the gun.

“You’re not going to shoot me, are you, pumpkin?”

“Kate, get out,” Mercado said to her. “Run. Let him do what he has to do.”

“No!” Kate glared at Raab, trying to fight through the vision of everything she once trusted and loved. All the pain he’d caused. It was going to end. Here. She shook her head and leveled the gun at his chest.

“I’m not running.”

“Put it down,” Raab said to her. “I’ve never wanted to hurt you, Kate. He’s right. You can get out now.”

“Oh, you’ve already hurt me, Daddy. Nothing in the world could undo the hurt you’ve caused.”

There was a calculating pause in Raab’s eyes. And then, with a smile that sent a chill through her, Raab slowly brought the gun back up to Mercado’s head.

“You wouldn’t shoot me, would you, baby? Not the person who loved you all these years? Who raised you? You can’t undo that, Kate, whatever you now feel. Not for this-”

Raab nudged Mercado with his foot and he rolled onto the floor.

“Please don’t make me do something horrible, Dad,” Kate said. Tears were streaming down her cheeks.