Chapter 34: The Betrayal of '99
Chapter 34: The Betrayal of '99
Arthur didn't look at her. He stared out the window at the dark marsh water.
"Arthur," Sarah demanded, her voice rising. "Answer me!"
"I was a young captain in the Marine Corps," Arthur said softly, his voice hollow. "I was hired by James’s father to oversee security at the Vance shipping terminal in Miami. There was a raid. A rival corporate group tried to hijack a shipment of pharmaceutical prototypes. I led the counter-strike."
He turned around, his eyes filled with an old, dark guilt.
"The leader of the hijackers was Thomas Sterling. But it wasn't a real hijacking, Sarah. It was a setup. James’s father had lured Sterling there to eliminate him. I didn't know that. I thought I was defending private property. I ordered my men to fire."
Sarah felt the air leave her lungs. "You... you shot my father?"
"No," Arthur said. "I shot your mother."
Silence crashed over the room like a tidal wave.
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"She was in the passenger seat of Sterling's vehicle," Arthur whispered, a tear finally cutting through the grit on his cheek. "I didn't see her until it was too late. Sterling escaped because my men were focused on the casualties. That's why James’s father hid you. Not out of guilt. Out of leverage. If Sterling ever came out of hiding to seek revenge, the Vances had his daughter. And I... I was the monster who kept you safe, never knowing I was the one who made you an orphan."
Sarah stumbled backward, her world spinning. The man who had caught her from the landing, the man who had delivered her baby, the man she had trusted with her life... was the architect of her mother's death.
