Chapter 23

CHAPTER 23

Anna’s words rung in her ears.

The woman had looked right at her when she said daughter .

“Are you . . . ?” Chelsea couldn’t finish her question. The thought seemed too absurd.

“Your mother?” Anna raised an eyebrow. “I am. Not that woman you keep calling Mom. Do you understand how hard it is for me to hear you say that?”

Now that Anna mentioned it, Chelsea could see the resemblance between them. They both had the same cheekbones, the same color hair even.

But . . . how could this be?

“You abandoned me,” Chelsea started.

“I had a breakdown. I wasn’t in my right mind. I couldn’t handle everything. Today they’d probably call it postpartum depression. But that wasn’t as widely discussed back then, and I didn’t understand it.”

“You could have come back. It’s been thirty years. Why now?”

“My life took a lot of twists and turns. I got involved with some of the wrong people. Had to do things I never thought I would just to scrape by. But finally, I made something of myself. That was when I knew I needed to win you back.”

“Certainly you don’t think this is the way to win me back, do you?” Chelsea stared at Anna in horror.

“I know it’s going to take time. But I also know that restoration will never happen while you’re here, surrounded by all these people who love you. I won’t stand a chance. That’s why the two of us are going to start a new life together where we can get to know each other one on one. I want to make up for lost time.”

Chelsea’s throat tightened until she could hardly breathe. Was Anna implying what Chelsea thought she was?

There was no way she wanted to go to the Caribbean with this woman, whether she was her real mom or not. The idea was crazy.

But how would she get out of this situation?

She exchanged a look with Tex. The look in his eyes indicated he had an idea.

Whatever it was, Chelsea prayed that it would work.

“Enough talking!” Anna snapped. “We need to get moving. Don’t make me take things to the next level.”

Whatever happened, Tex could not let Anna take Chelsea anywhere.

He had to stop this.

“Go to the car,” Anna ordered. “You’re going to drive, Tex. And I’m going to have this gun trained on you so don’t try to pull anything.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Tex said.

They began walking toward Chelsea’s vehicle.

He could get the gun away from Anna. But what he didn’t want was for her to accidentally discharge it in the process and end up hurting Chelsea.

He had to plan his moves carefully.

“One of my boyfriends taught me the best way to make a quick buck,” Anna explained. “Thanks to him, I now have a million dollars in the bank that we can live off of.”

“You got all of that by extorting people?” Chelsea asked.

“It sounds so terrible when you say it that way. All I did was hold them accountable for their actions. Made them pay for things they never should have done to begin with.”

“There has to be another way—” Chelsea started.

“There’s not. I’ve already thought this through.” Then Anna turned to Tex. “Get in.”

Tex kept his eyes on that gun as he began to walk toward the driver’s side. Once he got in the car, everything would be entirely more difficult.

That meant he needed to act now.

Just as Chelsea headed for the passenger side and put some distance between herself and Anna, Tex reached back and caught Anna’s arm.

Just as he feared, she fired.

But he made sure the weapon was pointed into the air.

Then he twisted the gun from her hands.

In three seconds flat, he had the woman pressed against the car with her hands trapped behind her head.

“Call the police,” he murmured to Chelsea.

But then a deeper voice behind them said, “Wait just a minute before you do that.”