Chapter 18 - THE CONFRONTATION AT GATE 14
"Get your hands off me, you violent bastard!" Callahan gasped, clawing at Daniel’s grip.
Port Authority officers instantly swarmed, pulling Daniel off the attorney, while Miller pinned Callahan against the check-in desk, clicking metal cuffs around his wrists.
"Vance Callahan, you are under arrest for conspiracy to violate a protective order, witness tampering, and child exploitation," Miller announced loudly.
Nicole stood frozen, her eyes darting toward the jet bridge door, but two female officers stepped in her path.
"Daniel, stop!" Nicole screamed, her voice cracking with hysterical rage. "You don't understand anything! You never understood!"
Daniel turned to his sister, his eyes burning with a mix of fury and profound, sickening heartbreak. "I took you into my home, Nicole. When you told us Margaret abused you, Emily cooked for you. Lily called you her favorite aunt. And you were plotting with Margaret to steal my daughter?"
"She is NOT your daughter!" Nicole shrieked, her mask completely disintegrating in front of hundreds of staring passengers. "She is MINE! Margaret took her from my body when I was nineteen! She told me you and Emily were the only ones who could raise her until the trust matured! I was forced to watch you play happy family for ten years while I sat in the corner like an outcast!"
"You signed the consent, Nicole!" Daniel yelled back, pulling out the folded medical file. "You took Margaret’s money to pay off your debts in Chicago!"
"Margaret lied to me!" Nicole wept, suddenly collapsing to her knees on the terminal carpet. "She told me Emily was dying of uterine cancer! She said Lily would be returned to me by her tenth birthday! And Callahan said if I helped Margaret file the Swiss paperwork today, Margaret would sign over all the estate funds to me and Lily!"
Daniel looked down at his sister with utter, devastating clarity.
Margaret had played them all. She had told Nicole that Emily was a dying thief. She had told Callahan that Daniel was an abusive monster. She had set every member of the family against each other like scorpions in a glass jar, watching them sting each other to death while she pulled the strings from her ivory tower.
"Where is she, Nicole?" Daniel asked quietly, his voice dropping into a lethal, cold register. "Where is our mother?"
Nicole looked up through streaming mascara, her lips trembling.
"She’s not in Savannah," Nicole whispered. "She was never in the nursing home, Daniel. Callahan checked her out four weeks ago."
May you like
Daniel felt a cold spike drive straight into his heart. "Where is she?"
"She’s in Fairfax," Nicole cried. "She’s waiting for Callahan to bring Lily to her."
