He Came Back Running (Maya and Mason) novel Chapter 300

Chapter 300

Mason’s POV

“We knew each other,” my father said. “Years ago. Connected through business, initially. But you’re wrong if you believe that

was the extent of it.”

“Then what was it,” I said.

He looked at the photograph in my hand rather than answering directly.

“There was considerably more to what happened between the three of us,” he said, “than a simple business relationship could ever explain.”

I studied the image again.

“What was happening,” I said. “When this was taken.”

My father did not answer.

I pressed harder.

“Was Alex’s father involved in your disappearance?” I said. “Did Richard Voss have something to do with why everyone believed you were dead?”

He was quiet for a long moment….

“People made choices during those years,” he said finally, “that cannot be undone now. I’m not interested in assigning blame across decades of decisions that all three of us contributed to, in our own ways.”

“That’s not an answer,” I said. “That’s a deflection”

“It’s the truth,” he said. “As much of it as matters right now.”

“Did he have something to do with Maya’s father’s death,” I said.

My father’s expression did not change this time…

“I’ve already told you,” he said. “I’m not assigning blame.”

“That’s still not an answer,” I said.

He said nothing further.

I looked at the photograph again…

At my father, younger, standing beside two men whose sons now occupied the complicated positions of adversary and something closer to reluctant ally within my own life.

“Why did Maya’s father have to die,” I said. “If the three of you were simply business associates, it whatever this was could have been resolved through ordinary means…. why did it end with what looks like murder that took nine years to even begin properly investigating?”

I looked at him directly.

“And why did you have to disappear,” I said. “If none of this was your doing, if you had nothing to hide, why take your own death and spend nine years watching your only son from the shadows instead of simply living your life?”

He looked at me for a long moment….

“Maya is getting dangerously close to the truth,” he said. “The documents she’s found, the fragments her father distributed before his death… assembled together, they could expose people who have spent years, decades in some cases, protecting

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themselves from exactly this kind of discovery.”

“People like you,” I said again

He did not deny it this time.

“What do you want me to do about it,” I said.

He looked at me directly….

“I repeat it again, Maya must be stopped,” he said, “before she discovers everything.”

I stared at him…

“You want me to go after her again,” I said slowly.

He did not soften the request. Did not dress it in careful language or offer some more palatable version of what he was actually asking.

“Yes,” he said.

I sat with that….

I looked at him…

“You said you’ve been watching me for years,” I said slowly.

“Yes,” he said.

“You knew about the divorce. You knew every mistake I made, every operation that went wrong, every choice that eventually led

me to a police chase tonight.”

“Yes,” he said.

“And you let all of it happen,” I said. “Every single piece of it. The obsession with Maya. The IV tampering. The wedding shooting. Marcus Webb. You watched me build an entire campaign of revenge against her and you never once intervened to stop me or put me in the right direction…..”

He said nothing.

“Why,” I said. “If you had the resources, the reach, the network of people who intercepted me tonight in a matter of minutes, why let me spiral for months, destroy my own life, become a wanted fugitive, before finally revealing yourself?”

“Because it served a purpose,” I said, answering my own question before he could offer whatever careful version he might have constructed.

The cold clarity arriving all at once, reorganizing everything I had believed about this entire conversation.

“You didn’t watch me from the shadows because you were protecting me,” I said. “You watched because my obsession with Maya was useful to you. Every operation I ran, every piece of pressure I applied against her and Alex, all of it was serving something you needed, something considerably larger than my personal vendetta.”

I looked at him.

“You didn’t lose control of your son,” I said. “You used him”

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