There’s something you need to know about Gideon.

Oh, Mama. Why didn’t you talk faster? Why didn’t you tell me long before it was too late? Because now Mercy knew the truth and it had upended everything she’d thought she’d known before.

“Or,” Mercy whispered, unwilling—unable—to say the word that haunted her waking thoughts and worst nightmares.

Eden. The cult that had fostered DJ Belmont, who’d killed her mother. The cult that had glorified Ephraim Burton, who’d . . . Hurt me. Over and over and over.

Farrah’s shoulders sagged because she understood all the implications of what Mercy hadn’t said aloud. “Oh, honey. Why now, after all these years? What changed?”

That was the question, wasn’t it? She’d escaped Eden thirteen years before, had undergone years of therapy to forget what she’d experienced. Well, not to forget. No one ever truly forgot sexual assault. But she was able to live with the memories, to relegate them to the proper places in her mind. She’d been doing so well.

Until Sacramento. Until Gideon. Until she’d learned the truth.

“Gideon,” she murmured. “He changed everything. I have to see him. To tell him that I’m sorry.”

Farrah frowned. “Sorry for what?”

“For hating him all this time.”

“Mercy, honey, we’ve had this conversation. He left you in that awful place. He killed his boss and ran away because he didn’t want to work. Left you and your mama to bear the consequences, which were brutal. Resentment is natural.”

Except that none of that was true. It was a filthy lie, concocted by the men who’d owned them back then. Why didn’t I question? Why did I believe that ridiculous story? Why did Mama let me believe it? A sob started to take root in her throat, and Mercy fought it back. “He was only thirteen.”

Farrah cupped her cheek. “I know. He was young and scared. He probably didn’t know what you and your mother were suffering after he left.”

Mercy shook her head. “No, you don’t understand. I found out something when I was here before. I found out why Gideon escaped. He didn’t just run away.”

Farrah’s eyes widened. “What? How did he escape, then?”

Mercy thought about her mama, about those final minutes of her life. “Mama told me to find him. Right before she was . . .” Murdered. Mercy couldn’t say that word, either. Because it was my fault. Her mother had sacrificed her life. For me. “At first I was shocked, because I’d thought he’d been dead all that time. But Mama said that he’d escaped, that he was alive, and that he’d help me. But then I got so angry. I said no, that he was selfish. Mama said, ‘There’s something you need to know about Gideon.’ And now I know what that was.”

Farrah waited patiently, as if they weren’t standing against the wall of a crowded airport terminal.

Mercy swallowed again. “They hurt him. They beat him. Almost killed him.”

“Oh my God,” Farrah whispered, horrified. “Why? Because he killed his boss?”