Page 62 of The Pawn

“Your mother. I saw the photograph on your laptop.”

“When you were snooping, you mean?” I tease.

“Yes. When I was snooping,” she confirms. “She was beautiful.”

“She was,” I say, shifting my gaze to the fire, thinking about the mother I never had the chance to know.

“And Seth, he looked like her too,” she probes.

I turn back to Allegra. After a moment, I decide to correct her. “Looks,” I say.

She tilts her head, confused.

“He looks like her. Sethlookslike our mother. More than I do.”

“I thought… Isn’t he… I thought he’d died.”

“You thought I killed my own brother.”

“No. I just…”

“It’s what everyone believes, Allegra. For a reason.”

“I don’t understand.”

I get up, walk over to the cabinet where I keep the whiskey and pour two glasses. I return to the couch and hand her one. She takes it and drapes her legs over mine as I settle back into a seat.

“It’s better if everyone believes he’s dead.”

“But, Cassian, people think you killed him. Why would you want that?”

“Because it’s better than anyone knowing the reality. Besides, ruthless is good in my business.”

She waits, quiet, forehead furrowed.

“He has Huntington’s disease.”

She is no less confused. “I’m sorry, Huntington’s? I don’t know anything about that.”

“Not many people do. Seth, he was barely in his thirties when he began to lose his mind.”

She gasps, slapping her hand over her mouth. “Oh my God.”

“He’s in a facility a little way out of town. He has the best care possible, and I try to visit him every few weeks,although these days I think my visits agitate him more than anything else.”

“He doesn’t remember you?”

I shake my head. “I don’t know. No, that’s not right. He remembers something, but it’s not me. Maybe it’s glimpses of a past life, but it’s gone as soon as it comes, and it only upsets him. Sometimes there are moments, glimmers of hope. At least I saw them that way for a long time.”Hope. There’s that damned word again. Something inside me stretches awake. “Those moments are often the worst because he’s gone and hoping isn’t going to bring him back. It’s not going to reverse what is irreversible.”

“Oh my God, Cassian. Is that why you look after Vivi and Gage?”

I nod. “I will always look after them.”

“Is that what your father has?”

“No. With my dad it’s early onset dementia. Sometimes it feels like we’re just fucked in every possible way.”

“It’s unfair.”