Unwanted Blood (Harper) novel Chapter 41

Chapter 41

My mother’s voice came through the earbuds.

“Harper,” it began, “if you are hearing this, Mama is no longer alive. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I couldn’t protect you. I couldn’t watch you grow. I couldn’t be there when you took your first steps or said your first word or had your first heartbreak. I missed everything. But I had to leave this here-because only you could open it. Only you knew the password. Your birth. The most beautiful last moments of my life.”

My vision blurred, I blinked hard.

“Next, I need to tell you something important. Westbrook was using the port project to launder money-millions, through shell companies, through fake invoices and ghost contracts. I found the records by accident. ”

She paused a moment. “I was going to go to the police. But they found out. Westbrook sent people to find me. They told me that if I spoke, my children would be next.

“I stayed quiet. I told myself I was protecting you. But silence doesn’t protect anyone. It only delays the damage. I’m sorry, Harper.

I clenched my fists.

“The port ‘accident’-the engineer who fell-it was a warning. They cut the harness on the crane to send a message to anyone else who might be watching. I didn’t know it would kill someone. This is my fault.”

“I tried to make it right. I gave pieces of the evidence to people I trusted. But I was running out of time.”

“Now, I’m bleeding in the delivery room. It wasn’t an accident. I know. They had someone in the hospital. But I was too weak to fight it.”

“He thought the evidence died with me. He was wrong.”

“Westbrook thinks all the evidence is with me. It isn’t. I split it into three parts. One went to

Everly, my lawyer. One went to Martha-the engineer’s widow, who lives in my house and hates me, but who I trust because she hates Westbrook more. And the third…”

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Chapter 41

“The third is you, Harper.”

288 (Vouchers

“You are the evidence. Your existence is the proof. Westbrook ordered my death because I was going to testify-about the payments, about the shell companies, about the women he’d paid off and the doctors he’d silenced. He couldn’t let me walk into that courtroom. So he made sure I wouldn’t leave the hospital. But he didn’t know I’d recorded this.”

Tears hit my cheeks. I didn’t feel them. I couldn’t feel anything except the voice in my ears and the weight of the words pressing down on every inch of my body.

“If you choose to fight them, I won’t stop you. I won’t blame you. They took everything from us.”

“But if you choose to live-to walk away, to be happy, to forget them-I will be happier still.”

“With all my love, Mama.”

I sat in the chair after I finished hearing it, and didn’t move.

Then I stood up. My legs were stiff. My face was wet. My eyes were red.

Then I wiped my face with the back of my hand, pulled the headphones off, and stood up.

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