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Iinto her shirt

"What?" Ivy said

I repeated ht, curled into a tiny ball beside her on the king-size bed In the , I could be mad at her I could hate her for the secrets she’d kept, the lies she’d told--but for now, for this one night, I wasn’t letting her out of rand sches and to me--ere family Not just in blood, not just because she was somehow responsible for half of my DNA We were family because I would always love herher would have killed ain with any devil, to keep her from harh fire for est time, we lay there, neither one of us asleep, neither of us saying a word, not even touching

I fell asleep to the rhythm of her breaths

So way to the first hints of h h my veins, but I forced my heart not to pound, forced h the aparth the foyer, and saw a slant of light co from the conference room

The door was cracked open I pushed it inward Ivy sat in theat the wall There were three pictures hanging there: Judge Pierce, Major Bharani, and Damien Kostas

"Ivy?" I announcedat the pictures so hard that I wasn’t sure she’d marked my entrance to the room Ivy turned to look at me She blinked twice

"So around the edges of her lips "Your father"

"You loved him"

"I did" She slid off the table and walked toward me "Some days, I still do" She tucked a stray strand of hair behind my ear I let her

"You’re not my mother" I softened those words as much as I could "I don’t know if I canI don’t knohat you are"

Ivy met my eyes "I’m yours"