Again, Persephone turned her weapon on the ground. She released Tammy’s wrists and retreated a bit from the other two women. When she looked to her mother again, her expression was equal parts accusation and disappointment.
“I thought we had the truth, Mama? Finally the truth. When I came to you-told you I was pregnant. What I planned to do and why I-why I couldn’t tell Hill...I thought we had the final truth then.”
“Baby,” on uncertain steps, Tammy shaved off the distance between her and her youngest child. Hands clasped between her breasts at the bodice of an ankle length pale blue sundress, her short bobbed hair stirred slightly as the wind tousled it around her dark, oval face. She appeared both desperate and hopeful.
“When you finally told me all of what happened there,” Tammy said, “How Evangela hated us and what she’d become I...I felt less information was more. I believed it was safer for you to be terrified of them and maybe you’d stay away.” She gave a miserable smile. “Flawed thinking? Yes, but if you knew...knew Maeva was your blood you may’ve gone on another insane mission to save her. It’s the way you are. When you told me about the girls...I didn’t know if even they would’ve been enough to stop you from going off the do what you thought was best.”
“And now here we are.”
Persephone fixed Mae with a long, doubting look and then put the
safety on the gun before turning back to Tammy. “No more wondering
what’s for the best, Mama. No more regretting the past. Tell me
now. All of it. Finally.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Because it would set her mother at ease and because she needed to, Persephone took a seat on a lounge chair nestled beneath one of the towering palms dotting her property. The women were getting settled as the girls returned. Utilizing teamwork, they balanced between them, a tray carrying a plate of chocolate snap cookies and tiny milk filled cups.
“Cookie, Mommy?” Layah asked in a prim manner. The little girl was happiest whenever the hint of a tea party presented itself.
Persephone helped herself to a cookie and then stole a kiss from Layah’s tiny mouth. “Thank you, baby.” She held onto the cookie, but didn’t eat preferring instead to watch as Leeya served Mae.
“You ladies go play now. Stay where we can see you.” Tammy instructed once the girls had supplied each woman with a cup of milk and a cookie.
A quiet smile softened Maeva’s wide mouth as she watched the sisters ramble off. “They’re sweet,” she said to no one in particular.
“Yeah,” Persephone sneered. “And yet you stood by while that bitch threatened to kill them.” She downed her cup of milk in one angry gulp.
“Honey,” Tammy inched toward the edge of the lounge she’d taken between her daughters.
“How long has she been here?” Persephone asked.
Tammy looked over at Mae. Compassion and a mother’s love were evident in her expressive brown eyes. “Two weeks,” she said, “two beautiful weeks.”
Persephone snorted out what sounded like a curse. “Alright Mama,” she tossed her empty milk cup to the tray on the bamboo-bottomed table between the lounges. Leaning forward, she braced her elbows on her knees. “Let’s have it. My gun still feels like it’s carrying one bullet too many.”
Maeva’s quiet smile remained. “I’m unarmed, Perry.”
“Gee, that’s too bad.”
“Persephone please!” Tammy’s fists clenched and she used them to bang the shellacked arms of her chair once. “Your anger-your hate is understandable and I’m sure Maeva would agree that it’s not without merit, but she had so little choice in so much of what happened. You must understand that the things I’m about to tell you took place long before you ever came into my life- long before I ever even thought I’d become or want to become a mother again. When you came into my world, I already had a wealth of experience and reason to want to keep you as far away from your sisters as possible.” Tammy leaned forward then and studied the lines tracking her palms.
“I was barely fifteen when I had your sisters.” Tammy looked up in time to catch the surprise flicker in Persephone’s eyes and she gave a knowing smile.
“Yes. Your sisters are twins- like our Leeya and Layah but... not quite. There were never any happy moments with Eva from the time she learned to walk and with Mae...something went wrong and I- I never knew what… I was very young- a child myself.” Her expression sharpened. “Marcus Ramsey was the father- he was a monster and he was a slut. Who knew what kind of disease clung to his sperm and infected my babies.” She interlaced her fingers, folding them down over her hands.
“My parents-hell...most of my family worked for the Ramseys in one form or another. Most every girl I knew wanted the attention of a Ramsey- they were a gorgeous lot.” She gave a rueful smile. “They still are,” she shrugged.
“It was just my luck that I...attracted the sickest of the bunch. He didn’t much care that I was a child…” Tammy hung her head, gave it a shake. “Anyway...when I got pregnant, I was terrified. I couldn’t tell my parents I’d had sex out of marriage, much less tell them I was pregnant and definitely not that I was pregnant by a Ramsey.” Tammy lifted her head and smiled out toward the stunning view of the Koolau Mountain Range.
“Willard Leer…We grew up together-his folks worked for the Ramseys too at one of Quentin Ramsey’s factories. He was a playmate- a friend when we got older, but I never saw him as anything more. Hmph,” Tammy gave another quick shake of her head.
“That’s not true...I saw him as a confidant- he was the only one I could tell and he understood. He got me out of there- out of Savannah-didn’t stop until we were far away. In those days, it wasn’t so out of place for two young kids to already be raising a family. Will gave me his name-gave the girls a name...I had to keep my happiness a secret when the chance came for Mae to take the name after what-what happened to her adoptive father...Cleon Raymond.”
Tammy shivered then and a haunted look ghosted across her coolly lovely features. “Will was a good man, but I never loved him.” She looked to Persephone. “That went to your father. That went to Brandon.”
“Mama, I understand your fear,” Persephone inched toward the edge of her chair as well. “I understand why, in that time, you felt like you couldn’t go to your family but-I mean, wasn’t there any other way to make it easier on yourself? Marcus was the one at fault and from what I’ve heard of the Ramseys, Quentin and Marcella- they were decent, they may’ve helped you raise-”
“Never!” The quiet that held Tammy’s features when she spoke of Brandon James, transformed into something lethal and sharp. “I would’ve died before letting my girls be raised by that vile family.”
Agitated, she tucked her hair behind her ears. “Carmen Ramsey was the only one who ever knew and the first time I told her about them I only told her of one baby, not two. I was only trying to plant seeds by going there in the first place. Carmen was the youngest of them and closer to my age. I thought if anyone ever got curious about me...her telling them that I was married with a child might stifle the conversation. I know the sickness doesn’t pertain to all of them. Carmen hated Marcus then almost as much as I did. I-I never knew why. Whatever I did...it was always what I thought was best to protect them.”
Persephone looked to her girls again, playing a game of tag in the distance. What was best to protect them? Hadn’t she tried to do the same? Right or wrong? “Did she know?” Persephone looked to her mother again.
“Eva? Did she know about Mae- who she really was?”
The sharpness of Tammy’s expression took on new definition. “She knew. I didn’t tell her. Will- he...he was a good man. He tried to be, I guess. He told Eva about Mae when she started sleeping with him. He said the first time she came in while he was taking a bath. She stripped and got right in the tub with him. Wasn’t long after that she started prying information out of him.
She’d heard us talking one night-didn’t know what to make of it, so she found a way to get the explanation she needed. Oh I didn’t know any of this at the time,” Tammy read the horrified disbelief in Persephone’s expression.
“There I was feeling terrible because I’d fallen in love with your father and there she was sleeping with her step-father. I walked in on them- it’s how I found out. She laughed and strolled out of the room. Will told me everything I just told you-he held nothing back but I...I couldn’t blame Evangela. She was just a child barely thirteen. I saw her in bed with my husband with my own eyes and still I believed she wasn’t capable of being what Will said she was. But...she was...she was every bit of it and more. No regrets. No remorse. There’s a blankness in her-just like there was in Marcus.”
Tammy selected another of the chocolate cookies; broke it in half, but didn’t eat. “I often think about that place where we lived. I told Will I wanted to get as far away from Georgia as possible and dammit if he didn’t make that happen.
Dolores, Colorado. Dolores is Spanish for ‘sorrows’ hmph...I always thought about how fitting that was-a perfect description for everything that happened there. I never expected to find peace- let alone happiness of all things. Not the kind of happiness I found with your father. The most happiness I expected went as far as Willard Leer being able to get me out of Savannah.
He helped me without question and for that, he was a good man. It seems cowardly to blame a child-to give her any part in corrupting the kind of man I knew Will to be, but...well...Evangela was most definitely her father’s daughter.”
“Mama,” Persephone placed a hand over her mother’s clasped ones. “Why didn’t you kick her out? Just get rid of her once you knew what she’d done, what she was?”
“Baby, your hatred of Eva makes that the obvious route to take and even though she was my child, it was the route I wanted to take, but as her mother, I waited because I loved her.” Tammy relaxed back against the chair’s cushions. “Had I not waited, she’d have probably taken me seriously, but when I finally got around to tell her that I wanted her to go, she threatened me. Cool as you please...told me she’d go to her ‘dad’. Said she’d tell Marc about all the things I’d kept from him. She spit in my face, called me weak and still...still I loved her- loved them both. Even after they killed Cleon. Through it all, protecting them was most important.”
Once more, Persephone looked to her children playing in the distance.
