2

Father Ivan Kempechny watched the car drive away from his hiding place on the roof of a nearby building. He said a prayer for the member of his flock, left dead there in the darkness of the alley, knowing who the killer was but sworn not to say anything. She had come to him that morning, with her baby crying in her arms, as she explained what she had to do. He had strongly advised her not to do it, but she was desperate and alone. She handed him the baby, and he had given his word that he would ensure her safety if she did not return.

There was no place in Russia that would be safe for the baby now. Shaking his head, he left the rooftop, heading back to his office at the nearby Russian Orthodox Church. He had contacts with international adoption agencies, and he had the foresight to have her sign the papers giving her for adoption before she left. Natalya could never be listed with any orphanage, never go through any open court proceeding. He knew a judge who would sign the adoption papers, and the agencies would find someone in America who would happily adopt the beautiful baby, even if the paperwork was shrouded in mystery.

A week later, Natalya was sleeping on her mother's shoulder as the plane crossed the Atlantic, bound for Minneapolis, Minnesota. In her mother's purse were the adoption papers and her new birth certificate. She was now Jessie Donato, daughter of airline executive Anthony Donato and his wife Cindy.

Mikhail never found her, a fact that cost him his life.

2018, Minnesota

Jessie's POV

A mugging gone bad took my father when I was two years old, and now cancer was taking my mother from me at twenty-one.

I sat in her bedroom, holding her hand, waiting for the pain medicine to kick in so she could sleep. Her once-beautiful face was pale, her eyes sunken, as the pancreatic cancer ate her from the inside.

The last six months had been horrible. I was going to school at Northwestern University on a full ride scholarship, in my junior year of the Mechanical Engineering program. I had come home for Thanksgiving when I found her. When I came through the door, she was lying on the floor holding her stomach, barely able to talk with the pain. I rushed her to the hospital, where she was taken from the emergency room to the oncology ward. The next day, the doctors in the room told us that the cancer was advanced, so advanced that surgery would not be possible.

I dropped out of school to care for her, and our savings quickly disappeared beneath the mass of bills left over from her insurance. I held her hair out of her face while she threw up after the harsh chemotherapy treatments, then held her shoulders after her hair had fallen out. The two rounds of chemo left us broke, and in the end, they accomplished nothing. The tumor hadn't shrunk enough to operate, and the cancer had metastasized.

I brought her home last month after she begged me to just let her die in her own house. We were broke now, our savings gone, her car sold, jewelry, everything. The house that was paid for, she took out a reverse mortgage on. I offered to use my savings, to sell the car I had worked through high school to buy, but she refused. "You don't pay for my bills," she told me as she pushed the money back to me. "My bills will die with me."

She squeezed my hand, weakly. "It's time," she told me as tears ran down my face.

"No, Momma!"

"I have no more strength to go on, Jessie. I'm tired of fighting it. Let me enjoy these last moments with you, my daughter."

I brought her hand to my lips, it was cold, and her skin was grey. "I love you, Mom."

"And I love you." She coughed, a little blood coming up that I wiped away with a tissue. "In the bottom drawer of the desk is an envelope, it has my will in it. There won't be anything left for you, I'm sorry I can't give you more."

"I don't want money, Mom, I want you."

"There will be some hard things for you to learn in that will, Jessie. Know that we never did anything to hurt you, only to protect you. You're my daughter and I'd do anything for you. Your father did too, he loved you. He'd be so proud to see the woman you've become."

We talked until the drugs took her to sleep. I made sure she was comfortable, then went out into the kitchen to make my dinner. I'd stopped at the food shelf and was lucky enough to find some fresh vegetables and frozen sausage among the canned goods and pastas. I started a pot of water to boil while I pulled ingredients together in a pan. I started the sausage first, rolling it into small balls before cooking it in oil. A green pepper and part of a red onion followed, finally some sliced mushrooms. The tomato sauce was canned, I didn't have enough fresh tomatoes to make my own sauce like I normally would. While the mixture cooked, I pulled the loaf of French bread out and sliced it at a slight angle. I put half in the freezer for later, it wouldn't stay like the pasta would in the fridge, and this meal needed to stretch for the rest of the week until I got to the weekend shifts at work. I could make enough tips to buy food on Saturday.

I put butter mixed with garlic powder in the bread I had sliced to the bottom crust, then put that in the oven. The water was at a rolling boil, and I added the bowtie pasta to it. After I stirred it, I opened a can of chicken broth and started to make a soup as well. Mom couldn't handle the tomato sauce, she could barely tolerate the broth and noodles I was making for her.

Dinner was a quiet affair. I had sold my laptop and iPad last month, and I stopped paying for cellphone service too. Mom's cable TV had been stopped three months ago as we cut our expenses, so I watched a DVD of Sons of Anarchy on the 21" television I'd moved into the room. I ate the pasta slowly, savoring the flavors. When I was done, I made a half-dozen meals in Tupperware containers and put them in the near-empty refrigerator.

The soup was done, I'd taken some of the cooked pasta and added that. I made up a bowl, adding a glass of water to the bed tray before taking it into her room. I pushed open the door to her room, bringing the tray over to set on the table next to her bed. "Dinner's ready, Mom," I said as I reached for the light.

I turned to wake her, and instantly knew it was too late. "Mom..." I sank to my knees, looking into her vacant eyes. Her hand was cold, and I reached down and checked her pulse while watching her chest. "Oh God, Mom." I collapsed on the bed, hugging her to me as the tears fell. She was free, I consoled myself. Free from pain, free from stress, free from cancer.

I don't know how long it was until I could sit up. With no phone service, I had to walk to the neighbor's and ask if I could use their phone. Thirty minutes later, the county coroner was removing the body and I was alone.

I didn't sleep that night.

I went into her room, turning on the lights and sitting at her desk. I remembered her words to me, and opened the drawer, flipping through the folders until I got to the one called "WILL." I opened it up, inside were two envelopes, one labeled "Last Will" and the other labeled "For Jessie".

I opened the will first. It was a standard document, she had left everything to me and had left me as her executor. That would not be fun, as she had more bills than assets now. As soon as I had all the documentation, I would have to start notifying the creditors. Legally, I had no obligations to make good on her debt, they would be fighting over the scraps left over when her estate was settled. She left instructions for her to be cremated, for me to scatter her ashes on the same Lake Superior overlook where she had scattered Dad. None of this was a surprise to me; I had been researching what would have to happen at the library and had already printed the forms I would need. The fact that I was afraid of Mom dying didn't change that I knew it would happen, and I had to prepare.

I put the paperwork down and opened the second envelope. Inside were originals of a couple documents; my heart stopped when I saw the first was a Certificate of Adoption.

I dropped the paper, unable to read further. I closed my eyes, remembering back to what Mom had told me earlier, the part I didn't understand. She had told me there would be some hard things to understand, but that she was my mother and had only done things to protect me. I wiped the tears from my eyes, looking down at the form again.

My real name was Natalya Klishnina, mother was Ekatarina, age 21, from Sergiyev Posad, Russia. My father was listed as unknown. Mom and Dad were listed, it was an international adoption brokered by a Russian agency. I was four months old at the time.

The final document was a letter, from a Priest. "Natalya, if you are reading this, you are now an adult and your parents have decided you should know the truth. I cannot tell you if you want to know that truth; while the truth can set you free, some truths should remain buried forever. This might be one of those."

I took a deep breath and kept reading. "I was your mother's priest for over a year after she returned from Moscow. She had left school and quit her job, needing to move back home to care for her sick mother. She was pregnant, frightened and alone. Your grandmother died soon after you mother returned, and I was the only other person there at your birth." I wiped a tear. "This is one of those points you have to ask yourself how much you want to know. If you continue to read, you cannot unsee it. If you were my charge, I would beg you to stop now, to burn the rest of this letter and go on with life. You will be happier if you hear just about how good a woman your mother was, and how much she loved you in the short time you had together. Hold onto that memory, do not stain it by reading on."

I put the letter down on the desk, getting up to go to the kitchen. I poured myself a glass of water, looking out over the houses in the older neighborhood. Our house was small and simple, built in the 1920's. As I drank the water and let the night breeze blow over me, thinking about what I had learned. I shouldn't want to know, but I needed to.

I went back to the letter. "Last chance, turn this page over and you will learn things no daughter should ever know."

I turned it over, my hand shaking