“What about my dad?” I ask. “Where was he?”
“He helped her.” Aunt sniffles and wipes her tears. “Or tried to, anyway. Now that I think about it, Eli’s death destroyed her just like Mum’s death destroyed my dad.”
Silence falls in the room short of my harsh breathing.
I should stop, process all the information I just gathered and then return with questions.
But now that I started, I can’t just stop.
I’m like an insatiable monster.
“How did I survive the fire, Aunt?”
“I really don’t know, Elsie.” She glimpses at Uncle and he takes her hand in his. “We were called for being your next of kin that day. We found you in the hospital, injured, and screaming. Sometimes, you’d hit me. Dr Khan said it’s because I remind you of your mother.”
“Injured?” I stare at them, incredulous. “I thought I needed the surgery because of my heart condition.”
“There was never a heart condition,” Uncle says.
“Jaxon!” Aunt shrieks.
“She needs to know everything we do, Blair.”
“W-what do you mean there was never a heart condition, Uncle?” My breathing deepens as if I’m an injured animal. “Then what about the scar? The doctor? The appointments?”
“Those are true, pumpkin. You did have heart surgery, but it’s not because of a heart condition.”
“Then because of what?”
“You were shot,” he says the word with pain. “It damaged your internal tissues and you developed a heart condition because of that.”
My feet falter and it takes all my strength to remain standing. “Who… who shot me?”
“We don’t know, Elsie.” Aunt sobs. “Even the police didn’t know. We were just happy you remained alive.”
“And how did Jonathan King come in the picture?”
Aunt wipes her cheeks. “He just showed up and told us he’d pay for your surgery and that we can pay him back later.”
“He never said why?”
Both of them shake their heads.
“We were desperate, pumpkin,” Uncle says. “We didn’t have that much money for the surgery, and we couldn’t process your father’s will when he just deceased.”
“My father’s will?”
“Your father, Ethan Steel, was a tycoon.” Uncle rubs the back of his head. “He has people running his fortune until you come of age to inherit it. You’re Steel’s heiress.”
“No, she’s not,” Aunt snaps then her eyes soften when they meet mine. “Steel empire was built as ruthlessly as Jonathan King built his. You don’t want that, right? You’re Elsa Quinn, not Elsa Steel.”
My gaze strays from Uncle to her. They’re watching me expectantly as if I’m about to drop a bomb.
I couldn’t care less about the Steel money or the last name.
The only image that keeps playing in my head is Ma singing me that haunting lullaby before someone drowned me in the water.
Ma was lonely.