My Ears Remembered

Chapter 5

That was exactly how my mother had been destroyed.

My father had an affair and decided Mom was in his way. Whenever anyone asked, he tapped his temple and told them there was something wrong with her.

The neighbors believed him. Our relatives believed him. Even social services came to our home to evaluate her mental health.

Mom became too ashamed to show her face in the neighborhood. In the end, she swallowed an entire bottle of sleeping pills. By the time she reached the hospital, it was too late.

I was 11 years old.

Ryan knew everything. He knew how my mother had died. He knew why, every year on the anniversary of her death, I took a 2-hour bus ride to visit her grave alone. He knew why my whole body shook whenever someone said "mental illness."

Yet to protect Chloe, he had seized those very words and driven them into my deepest wound.

"Look at yourself. You're hysterical, just like your crazy mother.

"You're every bit as irrational. Every bit as insane."

The surrounding whispers changed.

People were no longer entertained. Now they avoided me as if I were contagious.

Several customers nearby hurried backward, afraid I might suddenly attack them.

A mother clutched her child behind her.

"Where's security? Get her out of here! Who'll be responsible if she hurts a child?"

The bank manager waved to the guards.

Two of them closed in on me from either side.

"I'm not mentally ill. My mother wasn't, either."

I raised my head. My voice trembled, but I fought to make every word clear.

No one listened. The guards grabbed my arms roughly and dragged me toward the door.

In the struggle, I fell. My lower back struck the stainless-steel base of the writing counter.

Pain stabbed from my back into my abdomen. Warm liquid began trickling down the inside of my thigh.

Instinctively, I caught Ryan's pant leg, my voice shaking.

"Ryan, I am really pregnant."

He didn't bend down to help. He glanced at me and kicked my hand away, pure revulsion in his eyes.

"Even if you are pregnant, Mia..." He paused as if searching for the cruelest words he could find. Then his lips twisted into a vicious smile I had never seen before. "I would never want that baby. Who knows what filth runs in your family's blood? I'm not raising a child who might grow up as crazy as you."

He turned away. "Come on, Chloe. You can make the transfer at another bank. You just got back, and I still haven't treated you to a welcome-home dinner. What do you feel like eating?"

Someone laughed.

Someone else held up a phone to record.

I lay on the cold marble floor, feeling something leave my body little by little.

"Come on, ma'am. Stop causing trouble."

The guards hauled me upright. My knees felt like cotton, and darkness washed over my vision in waves.

Chloe had already taken another bank card from her purse and started toward the investment counter across the lobby...

Crash!

The glass doors burst inward under a powerful kick.

Black tactical shields surged into the lobby, followed by an entire SWAT team. Their boots struck the marble in a unified thunder.

Rifle barrels locked onto every person still moving.

Everyone froze.

Chloe's hand hung in midair, her feet rooted to the floor.

Ryan's contempt turned to shock, then fear.

Dressed in black tactical gear, Noah strode toward me.

When he saw the blood spreading across my pants, his pupils contracted.

With great effort, I raised a hand and pointed at the new bank card in Chloe's grip.

"She switched between three accounts... The voiceprint on the last one is a 97 percent match... for the suspect in my 30-million-dollar cross-border fraud case from last year..."

"Mia, you're bleeding!"