Tangled Lies Read Online Free PDF Page A

given me more joy than I ever expected, than I ever deserved.”
    She wiped her cheeks with shaking hands, and Sasha had to sit on her own hands to keep from rushing over and begging her to stop. This kind of emotional display had never happened when they were growing up. Mama was always brisk and matter-of-fact, quick with a bone-crushing hug or an unexpected swat with a kitchen towel.
    “I wanted my girls home, not just because it’s my birthday, though I thank you from the bottom of my heart for sharing this day with me. No, I want something more from you three oldest.”
    Sasha exchanged raised eyebrows with Eve, but Cat wouldn’t meet her eyes.
    “Of course, Mama. Whatever you want,” Sasha said.
    “If we can give it, we will,” Eve qualified.
    Mama smiled. “Always a negotiator, my Evelyn.”
    “I just meant—” Eve began before Mama interrupted.
    “I know you do not make promises lightly, nor would I want you to.” She smiled and took a deep breath, looking from one to the next. “You all know about the chemo, yes? Pop has filled you in on the details.”
    Everyone nodded.
    “Good. He also told you they are trying an experimental therapy?”
    Sasha, Cat, and Eve nodded, but Blaze sprang up and ran from the room, both dogs at her heels. Pop would have followed, but Mama laid a hand on his arm, a familiar gesture that jabbed Sasha in the heart. “Let her go. It may be best she not be here just now.”
    Sasha fingered the mariner’s cross at her neck and exchanged another furtive glance with Eve. “What’s this all about, Mama?”
    Again, the gentle smile. “Sasha, my impatient one.” She coughed, a deep, racking sound that raised goose bumps on Sasha’s arms. Mama leaned her head back and took several deep breaths before continuing.
    Sasha leaned forward, hands clasped between her knees. “Mama, please. What do you need? How can we help?”
    Mama smiled once more, and Sasha swore she could see right through her skin. It made her want to bang on the cypress paneling, so she gripped her hands tighter and waited.
    “You remember Tony, no? My baby who was stolen from my arms before you girls came?” She pulled a ratty-looking teddy bear from the basket beside her chair, and Sasha’s heart clenched.
    “Of course,” Sasha said. It was a story they’d heard many times. Mama and Pop’s biological son, Tony, had been three the day he disappeared. He had been playing in the yard, and Mama had gone in for another load of laundry. The phone rang while she was inside, and when she finally returned, Tony had vanished. Despite an exhaustive search by police and, later, a private investigator they’d hired, no one had ever been able to find a single trace of Tony. The prevailing opinion was that Tony had fallen in the water and drowned, his body swept out to sea.
    Mama stroked the ragged bear, and apprehension flitted down Sasha’s spine, mingling with her confusion. “But what does that have to do with us?”
    Mama took a deep, rattling breath and focused first on Eve, then Cat, then Sasha before she said, “I want you to find him.”
    Sasha fell back against the sofa as though she’d been pushed. She locked eyes with Eve, whose shock no doubt mirrored her own. Cat looked equally shaken. “Find him?” Cat said. “Mama, what are you saying? What are you asking?”
    Some of the familiar fierceness returned to Mama’s faded brown eyes, and Sasha’s shock eased a fraction. “I have not lost my mind. I am sick. I have been sick.” She held up a hand. “And before you all tell me I will be fine and I will get well, we don’t know that. Although I have faith that God will heal me.” She patted Pop’s hand. “So, in either case, I need to know what happened to my boy, my firstborn.”
    Eve cleared her throat. “Um, what if he’s, ah . . .”
    “Dead?” Mama nodded. “It is a possibility. They never found one single trace of my baby. But in here”—she patted her heart—“I believe he is