Page 55 of Destiny
“You did.” She turns her gaze to my father. “You did it because you wanted information from me. You want information now, don’t you?”
“Yes, I want information, but I don’t want to experience the sickness I felt the last time I called you Mother. You’renotmy mother, Wendy. You never were. Daphne Steel was my mother in every way that counted.”
“Daphne Steel was crazy.”
“Daphne Steel was the product of her childhood. She was…” He shakes his head. “I don’t need to tell you all of this. I’m sure you know.”
“Yes, I do know. I know her half brother, Larry, assaulted and raped her, along with Tom Simpson and Theo Mathias.”
“My guess is you orchestrated it.”
“I can see why you might think that, but I didn’t, actually. That was all Theo’s doing.”
I shudder.
Theo Matthias was my grandfather as well. On Mom’s side.
“He was obsessed with Daphne.”
“Here’s what I don’t understand…Grandmother,” I say.
Dad seethes.
But I’m going to get the truth out of her by any means necessary.
“You all went to high school together. You, my grandfather, Daphne’s half brother, Tom, and Theo. How did Brad Steel not know Daphne then?”
“Brad wasn’t involved in the club as much as the four of us were. He and Theo weren’t close, not in the way Theo was close to Tom and Larry. He knew Larry had a sister, but that was it. They didn’t live together. Larry lived with his mother here on the western slope, and Daphne lived in Denver with her parents.”
“So Brad knew of Daphne but never met her.”
“That’s right, Ava. And Daphne didn’t know the identity of her rapists until…”
“She knew. She just kept it compartmentalized, in the head of her other personalities.”
“Ava…” Dad says.
“I’m sorry, Dad. But I need to know the answers to these questions. I just don’t understand how all of this could’ve happened.”
“You’re talking about things that happened fifty years ago. Wendy may not even remember everything. She’s an old woman, Ava.”
Wendy’s eyes narrow. “I’m an old woman with a mind as sharp as a tack, Ryan. Do you even doubt that for a moment?”
Dad says nothing.
I know what he’s thinking. He’s thinking about Wendy and her genius IQ.
“Did you know I used to paint, Ava?” Wendy says.
“No, I didn’t.”
“Your sister’s talent clearly comes from me. Your father’s creativity also. How is he able to make wines that no one else in the world can make?”
“Dale can make them.”
“Only because he learned from your father.”
“That’s not fair, Wendy,” Dad says. “Dale is a huge talent in his own right.”