30. Georgia

30

Georgia

Now

" Y ou?" I choke out as I stare at Mrs. Foster, my gaze flitting back and forth between her and my daughter. Auden looks too still in her arms.

"Is she—" I choke on my words.

Lydia shakes her head. "No, she's not dead. Not yet, anyway. But if you try anything, I'll drop her into the lake. Fitting end, isn't it? After what you and your mother did to my own little girl."

My entire body is alight with fear. A soul-consuming fear that I've never felt before.

"Auden, baby girl. Mommy is right here." Tears sting my eyes as I stare at her limp, nearly lifeless form.

Mrs. Foster laughs, a hideously cold laugh. "She can't hear you. I gave her a snack before bed while you were—indisposed. Just a few melatonin gummies. I won't let her suffer the way you let my Irene. This is much more humane. She'll just slip into the water and eventually gasp for her last breath before she joins my own sweet girl."

Realization and panic flood my veins as I continue to stare at Mrs. Foster.

"It was you. You were the one who tried to poison me," I say, my voice quiet with shock. "It wasn't my mother."

My father was right. My mother wasn't responsible for her own demise. This person—this fucking monster took her from me.

I spent my whole life thinking my mother hated me, but this entire time, my mother's ghost has been trying to warn me.

Don't trust —don't trust Mrs. Foster.

Protect —Auden.

My mother has been trying to protect me, not torture me.

The revelation is like a punch through my heart. It hits so hard, I nearly fall to my knees as they threaten to buckle underneath me.

But I can't afford to buckle under the weight, not when my daughter's life hangs precariously in this monster's arms.

I shake off the invisible weight of my heart shattering, steeling my nerves for whatever comes next.

"Why are you doing this to us?" I ask, my voice surprisingly calm despite the nonstop hammering of my heart.

Maybe if I keep her talking, it'll buy us some time.

Time for Ian to get my message and come back from wherever the hell he disappeared to.

I should have told him Auden was his daughter.

I shouldn't have waited.

What if—what if he never gets to hear her call him Dad?

I'm such a fucking idiot.

The worst type of coward.

I send a silent prayer that he makes it here in time, that he hears my message, that he gets to hold his daughter and know that she's ours .

Mrs. Foster scoffs. "You know why I'm doing this, Georgia. Your mother killed my daughter to save you. It's your fault my Irene was taken from me. You may not have been the one to push her under, but it's your fault she was in this lake that night. I can't punish your mother any further than I already have," Mrs. Foster says cooly, but I can see the effort she's making to keep her own emotions in check.

My mouth opens in surprise before I snap it back shut. "You have it all wrong. It was me who sleepwalked into this lake. Irene drowned trying to save me. My mother had nothing to do with it other than covering it up to keep me safe."

Mrs. Foster shakes her head, a maniac smile tugging on her lips as she adjusts under Auden's weight again. She won't be able to hold her much longer; her strength is already waning.

Where are you, Ian?

"I felt so guilty for killing Caroline. It was supposed to be you who drank the lemonade. I wanted her to know what it was like to lose her only daughter. It was supposed to be you. But when she died, I felt like you had suffered enough. Growing up without a mother, that seemed a fitting enough punishment. But then, I found her little diary. The diary that told the true tale of what happened to my sweet Irene."

I give her a puzzled look.

"Oh, you haven't read that far yet? Let me sum it up for you. Your mother pushed Irene into the water to save you. You sleepwalked into this same lake, and my sweet Irene followed you in, trying to save you," she spits out.

"Irene grew tired, and she started to use your body as a life raft. Your whore of a mother pushed her off and left her to drown in this lake. I didn't know the full story until after you left Crane when you were off to college. But when I read it, read the truth, I knew you needed to be punished, too. I just wasn't sure how."

I take a small, hesitant step closer to Mrs. Foster. "Then kill me, not my daughter. She's innocent. She's done nothing wrong. It's my fault Irene is gone. Take me, please."

Tears are streaming down Mrs. Foster's cheeks. I can see the wet trail in the moonlight.

"You don't have to do this," I plead. "Take your revenge out on me, not my child."

Mrs. Foster shifts her weight again. "Oh, no, Georgia dear, this has been my plan from the beginning," she says. "You see, I kept tabs on you as soon as Ian came running back to Crane with nothing but his duffle bag and broken heart. I couldn't let you get away with destroying both of my children."

A fierce, fiery glare erupts from her eyes as she stares me up and down.

"Imagine my surprise when I went to see you just a few months later and saw that you were expecting a child of your own. I had planned to confront you for breaking my son's heart. My boy would have given you the world, and you spit on his affections. How dare you think he's not good enough for you? You! Ha! The girl who caused the death of his own sister. I went there to tell you that I knew Irene's death was your fault and that you needed to stay away from my son."

I strain to keep my breathing steady, but a glimmer of hope lights up in the form of headlights near the main entrance of Crane. I keep my focus solely on Mrs. Foster. I can't let her see the car's headlights bouncing up the gravel road.

Please let it be Ian. Please.

Mrs. Foster starts to turn her head when an audible noise comes from behind her. "You know nothing about what Ian and I have gone through. Nothing!" I scream out, praying to anyone who will listen that she keeps her attention on me.

Mrs. Foster lets out another humorless laugh.

"No, Georgia. You know nothing. You don't know how easy it was to slowly lure you back here. How patient I've been. When I found out that you had a daughter of your own, I couldn't stop the jealous, hideous thoughts that plagued me. Knowing that you get to be a mother to this sweet girl after you ripped my own from this world...it just wasn't fair. But I knew that was how you needed to be punished. The same way you and your mother punished me by taking my Irene from me. You see, my revenge has been a long time coming. I needed your daughter to be the same age as my sweet Irene so that when I took her from you, you'd know the same pain you and your mother inflicted on me."

The car lights have completely disappeared, and I struggle to hear the sound of a door slamming shut. It had to be Ian. Who else would be coming to Crane at this hour? Unless I imagined the lights? What if nobody is coming to save us?

"Where's your husband?" I ask Mrs. Foster. "Does he know the twisted and horrendous things you've done?"

"Heavens no. The man is utterly useless now that he's stepped up in your father's place at the rigs. A nice little reward for him, don't you think? It wasn't easy to slowly poison Lincoln. I didn't want him to die, but I needed an excuse for you to bring Auden here. Gabe is the one that told me about the aconite, after all."

I raise an eyebrow at her. "Aconite?"

"Aconite, wolfsbane, same thing. Those deceptive, pretty purple flowers are deadly when ingested. I didn't realize how potent the dosage was when I slipped some into your cup of lemonade all those years ago. But I know better now. I learned. Adapted. And I've been giving Lincoln small enough doses in his morning coffee to keep him weak. Weak enough to cause alarm, to bring you home." Lydia says the last part with a sinister smile, making goosebumps trickle up and down my spine.

"You did all of this just to punish me," I say, my voice hard as I stare her down once more. "But if you kill my daughter, then you're punishing Ian, too."

Mrs. Foster howls with laughter. "Oh, dear, he'll get over you. He should have gotten over you when he found out that you spread your legs for another man mere minutes after you sent him away. I'm not worried about Ian's thoughts on the matter."

This time, I'm the one who laughs. An ugly, hoarse laugh.

"Oh, Lydia, how wrong you are," I say, risking another small step closer to her. "If you kill my daughter, then you're killing his daughter, too."