Eighteen years of conditioning doesn’t just disappear over night, not even with her father’s dirty secrets aired out to dry and the blonde momentarily locked away for a crime that just the thought of leaves her sick to her stomach. Estelle’s words hurt because they’re familiar, ones her father had never said out loud but made known nonetheless, ones that she had used against herself plenty of times before. Estelle is just as cold and calculating as the rest of them, as the people who raised them, and Belva’s blue eyes watch her as that frustration turns into something that she can’t quite name. Even the threat, one that she doesn’t doubt the other woman would carry through, doesn’t bring the same sense of panic that those in the past have brought. Perhaps emerging from the bunker largely unharmed has made her braver, or perhaps she’s just less concerned for her own safety than she was before. She knows that it would be healthier if it were the first option, but everything that has happened recently has left her with a feeling in her chest that can only be described as incredibly heavy.
“You’re right, it really isn’t.” Her lips are pursed, expression neutral as she gives a tiny nod. She matches Estelle’s volume, not because she cares about the people listening in (perhaps the people of Vertmoor deserved to know what had been festering in their quiet town), but because volume doesn’t dictate impact. “Because I don’t understand how you could know that our parents were involved in something like that and not be upset about it. Not be angry.” Because even if none of them knew the exact details of whatever the Vidal Athanas Foundation was behind, there was enough there to piece together that it was nothing good. That it was perhaps the reason there were memories none of the Athanas children could find, locked away, parts of themselves boarded up that they had no way to rediscover. That it was the reason people kept turning up dead, with only more questions left to answer. “We don’t have to be our parents, Estelle. Maybe they don’t deserve us keeping their secrets anymore.” Her words are genuine, perhaps something resembling a plea as she looks at the older woman. There had been a time where she had done her father’s bidding without questions, but she wasn’t that girl anymore; not after he proved he didn’t deserve it again and again.
Estelle trained her eyes on Belva, any warmth that had been in them draining away slowly and then all at once. “Involved in what exactly? You’re so up in arms about it, you must know every detail so, go on. What was it that they were doing?” What happened behind the sealed doors of the foundation was hidden away for good reason. People would ask too many questions, get too many ideas, and leap to false conclusions. Was it all legal? No, even Estelle knew that but when you knew the means justified the ends? What good could their work do versus what sacrifices were made to get there? She liked to think it would be worth it. And if her mother supported it, so did she.
“If I had parents like yours, I wouldn’t want to be like them either. To be quite fair, I don’t know who my father is so perhaps I don’t want to be like him but we’ll never know. As for my mother...if I turn out to be half the woman she is, I will be twice the woman yours was.” She took a step away, preoccupied as her phone vibrated with an incoming text from Christian. “And if you’re concerned about secrets, Belva, I would worry about your own family’s, there are plenty to keep you busy without having to dig around in mine.”
2087
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