Chapter 8 - The Choice at the Lake
Rachel ran through the smoke.
Lena followed, shouting for agents to move toward the lodge.
Flames climbed through the dry grass behind the camp, but the buildings had not caught fire yet.
Rachel reached the lake.
Evelyn sat tied to a chair at the end of an old wooden dock.
Vanessa knelt beside her, blood running down one arm.
Celeste stood behind them with a pistol.
She was nearly seventy, with silver hair pulled into a neat knot. Her face resembled Evelyn’s so closely that Rachel felt as though she were looking at a cruel reflection of her mother.
“Stop there,” Celeste said.
Rachel stood at the beginning of the dock.
“You wanted me. Let them go.”
Celeste smiled.
“I wanted truth.”
“You poisoned a child.”
“Vanessa poisoned her.”
Vanessa lowered her head.
Celeste continued. “Thomas tried to seize the trust. I allowed it because money was the only language he ever understood. But this was never about six hundred thousand dollars.”
“What was it about?”
“Your mother’s choice.”
Evelyn struggled against the ropes.
“Celeste, please.”
“All our lives, you chose someone else. Father. Richard. Rachel. Even Vanessa, when it was useful.”
“You disappeared.”
“You pushed me out.”
“You stole from people.”
“I took what your husband owed me.”
Rachel saw movement in the trees. Lena and two agents were approaching from opposite sides.
Celeste noticed Rachel glance away.
She pressed the gun against Evelyn’s head.
“One daughter leaves with her,” she said. “The other stays.”
Rachel’s stomach turned.
“What does that mean?”
“You choose whether I take Vanessa or Maya.”
“Maya isn’t here.”
“She can be.”
Celeste lifted a remote control.
A live camera feed appeared on a monitor beside the dock.
Maya sat in the guesthouse living room with Daniel.
Rachel’s breath caught.
Celeste had hacked their security system.
“Touch her and I will kill you,” Rachel said.
“Choose.”
Vanessa began crying.
“Take me.”
Celeste struck her across the face.
“You do not choose.”
Evelyn looked at Rachel.
“Do not answer her.”
The fire crackled closer.
Rachel understood that Celeste did not intend to release anyone. She wanted Evelyn to suffer through the same rivalry that had defined their childhood.
So Rachel refused the rules.
“I choose all of them.”
Celeste’s expression hardened.
“That is not an option.”
“It is the only option.”
Rachel stepped onto the dock.
Celeste aimed the gun at her.
“You always were Evelyn’s favorite.”
“No,” Rachel said. “I was the daughter who learned to stay quiet. Vanessa was the daughter who learned to scream. Neither of us got what we needed.”
Vanessa looked up.
Rachel continued walking.
“You found the wounds in our family and made them deeper. But they were there because we kept secrets. That ends now.”
Celeste fired.
The bullet struck the dock near Rachel’s foot.
Agents moved from the trees.
Celeste grabbed Evelyn and pulled her from the chair, using her as a shield.
Vanessa suddenly lunged.
She wrapped both arms around Celeste’s waist.
The gun discharged again.
All three women fell against the railing.
Rachel ran forward.
The rotten wood broke.
Celeste and Vanessa plunged into the lake.
Evelyn remained on the dock, screaming.
Rachel jumped after them.
The water was black and freezing.
She saw Vanessa struggling beneath the surface while Celeste gripped her hair.
Rachel kicked toward them.
Vanessa’s injured arm hung uselessly.
Rachel struck Celeste’s wrist until she let go.
Agents reached the water in boats.
Lena pulled Evelyn away from the collapsing dock.
Rachel dragged Vanessa toward the surface.
For one terrible second, Vanessa stopped moving.
Then Rachel felt agents lift them both into a boat.
Celeste surfaced farther away and tried to swim toward the opposite shore.
A federal agent ordered her to stop.
She ignored him.
A second boat blocked her path.
Celeste raised the pistol she had somehow kept.
Lena fired from shore.
The bullet struck Celeste’s hand, and the gun fell into the lake.
Agents arrested her in waist-deep water.
Vanessa coughed violently beside Rachel.
“You saved me,” she whispered.
Rachel looked at her sister.
“I saved my mother’s daughter.”
It was not forgiveness.
But it was a beginning.
At the hospital, Evelyn was treated for dehydration and bruising. Vanessa needed surgery for a bullet wound through her upper arm.
Celeste survived and was placed under heavy guard.
The family should have been safe.
But when Daniel called from the guesthouse, his voice was panicked.
“Maya is gone.”
Rachel’s heart stopped.
“What?”
“The security feed was prerecorded. I went upstairs for two minutes. When I came back, the back door was open.”
Celeste had not abducted Maya.
She had been at the lake.
Thomas was locked in a secure hospital ward.
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That meant a third conspirator had taken Rachel’s daughter.
And this person had been close enough to enter the guesthouse without raising suspicion.
