"Dad?" Nina asks before snatching the phone away from Fabian. He was shuddered at her speed and tried to stop her, but she wouldn't budge.

"Repeat what you were saying." She said in a threatening tone that would scare anyone away. She sure was hurt by the revelation.

After a few minutes of silence, Fabian could see Nina's face changing from anger to that of sheer disappointment. The phone got disconnected a while ago but she was still holding it. Fabian slowly reaches out to her, taking away the phone and letting her fall into his warm embrace. He could feel her silently sobbing and he caressed her hair, whispering to let it out. They stay like that for some while.

2 hours before the call...

"It would definitely be a good idea. To make Nina against Jerome." Patricia smirks as she kept her phone down. Her father-in-law wasn't very happy to know that Mara was in the station and he ordered 'his' men to threaten Jerome for not following the plan. But Fabian ruined it all. It was time for Patricia to hatch up a plan and Alphie was the one to take the bait.

She called in Alphie to her office.

"Were you aware of the fact that Mara was in the police station?" sounding a little pissed.

"Yes...yes ma'am." Alphie stutters, thinking that Patricia had no foul play in this.

"Do you get how risky it was? I let go of the reporter's incident only to be hit by this now? Do you immature people even think what we adults are going through to protect you all? All thanks to Fabian that he was there at the right time."

Alphie looks at her with a confused look on his face. He had not expected her to say this if she was involved in this. This means it was more clear that this wasn't Patricia's doing.

"I got a call from one of my men in the station who saw her there and called for backup immediately to escort her back to the villa, only to find that Mara is being kidnapped by people. Do you know how scared I was? I was relieved later to find that you and Fabian already knew." She takes a long breath and fiddles with her pen stand, "I hope to find those men but I don't think it's a good idea."

Alphie's eyes got stuck on the laminated board beside the pen stand. The moon brooch?

"Those men knew more about Mara than we already showed to the public. They did not hurt her which means that they only meant to threaten us. So I think we should bury the matter here. Alphie are you listening?" she snaps him from his thoughts.

"Uh...yes ma'am...I got it. No digging up on who kidnapped Mara." He hesitatingly continues, "Whose brooch is that?" he asks pointing his trembling fingers towards it.

"This? You don't know? This is the party's official brooch." She looks at him innocently. She chuckles at the back of her mind, knowing that the plan is working.

"Why do we have two different ones? We all wear the ones with a star on it." Alphie questions.

"Because that is a political organization. For the world, Williamson Securities and Nationalist Party (Jerome's political party) have nothing in common. So we have different brooches to distinguish our men from Jerome's men. Why do I keep thinking that you have forgotten everything that I have taught you? Don't you already know all of this?" Patricia looks down, hiding her smile. It's working!

Alphie is still trying to process everything. He didn't want to trust Patricia so he bowed quietly and left her office. But as soon as he was about to enter the lift, he saw Jerome smiling at him, the same moon brooch on his tie.

How do I tell this to Nina?

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Patricia made sure that Alphie has left the office so that she could have a face to face talk with Jerome. She already knows that Alphie, being a big mouth has already told Nina about it and it was time to make Jerome realize his mistake. He was oblivious to the events of the day and thought he was meeting Patricia to discuss the further campaign.

"Didn't I warn you to not screw this up?" she smirks at him and turns towards the screen.

Jerome looks at the video of Mara being kidnapped, helplessly. He could feel his insides burning, boiling in anger, but more importantly, he was feeling as if was falling into this never-ending pit of guilt. The guilt of putting his daughter in danger.

Patricia turns to him. She felt sad looking at the man she once loved being so helpless. Yes, she loved this man with all her heart. Loved. It made her do things she never imagined herself doing. But those feelings were long forgotten. All there was left was the feeling of emptiness in both of their hearts.

"I told you to follow the plan strictly. I told you dad was involved in it. Before you take this in the wrong way, those were dad's men. You shouldn't have done that. I hope you realize your mistake now." Patricia looks away. She would not let him see that she felt any kind of sympathy towards him.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Mara opens her eyes to see Nina sitting beside her, softly caressing her forehead. She sits up in a jolt, pushing her hand away.

"Where....where am I?" she calmed down a bit when she noticed that it was her room.

"Shh....we are here....I am right here....you are okay..." Nina holds her hand. Mara looks away to hide her tears. She knew what would Nina ask her and that she would have to lie to her. Again.

"I am not going to ask you why you went there. I am just going to ask you that did dad say something to you. What made you go looking for answers?" Nina looks at her sister with pleading eyes. She still can't believe her own father would do something like that but the situation just seems otherwise. Maybe he changed after staying with Patricia for so long that he forgot that they were his daughters.

"No. We just talked. I found the station's address in your room. Why did you hide it from me? Are you the only one who is concerned about mom's death?" Mara tries to raise her voice to seem as if she is really angry.

"I did not hide anything. I just did not know what you would do after talking to either Tyler or the culprit. I have talked to them a hundred times and they would budge. Plus I was protecting you. If you had told me you were going, you wouldn't have been kidnapped." Nina caresses her cheek softly. She was genuinely scared and still was. If Mara doesn't believe her, she has to go to extreme ends to make sure she is safe.

Mara pushes her hand and looks away hiding her tears. She does not have the heart to hurt Nina.

"Or are you afraid I will find something out? Who the real culprit is?" Mara gulps.

"What are you saying?" Nina asks, genuinely confused. Why has Mara taken a whole 180 degree turn when all was well between them?

"You confessed when you were little. That you killed mom." She says it all in one breath. "The counseling sessions we both had? You confessed to them. But later your mind fabricated the story with Patricia to cope up with the trauma." She looks at Nina's face turning pale. She could see she was hurt. She could see she was confused.

Nina was just numb. She does remember the counseling sessions but doesn't remember what she told them. Did she really kill their mother?

"Who told you this?" tears were welling into her eyes.

"Dad. He said not to mention it to you but I can't see you being this delusional. Nina, you don't have to be scared. No one will ever know. Just, stop blaming Patricia for something she never did. We have been treating her in a bad way when she has done so much for us." Mara now holds her hands.

Nina violently gets up, unable to stop her tears and dashed out of the room. She bumps into Fabian on the way but doesn't lookup.

"Just leave me alone!" she pushes past him and locks her door. Fabian goes towards Mara's room to finally talk to her. He found the piece of paper with the coded message and it wasn't long enough when he cracked it and his suspicions were proven. Mara was lying!

He opens her door with a slam, "What did you say to her now?"

"It's none of your business!" Mara turns her back towards him. She herself was on the verge of tears.

"Cut the act, Mara! You tell me everything or I am showing this to your sister!" he holds up the paper. Mara turns to see it with wide eyes but once she sees Fabian's eyes burning with fire, she sighs and tells him everything.

"You shouldn't be doing this alone! Mr. Jerome would never allow you to do this alone! I will talk to him!" he gets up but Mara holds his arm.

"No don't! He did not tell me to go anywhere. I wanted to. I wanted to protect Nina better. But I never knew this would happen." She pleads him.

"But Mara, we all are here to protect her. You should talk to her about this. This is breaking her heart." He wipes a tear from Mara's cheek, "And from what I see you are hurting more."

"I can't. Dad said not to remind her of those memories. And she would not let me protect her. You know how she is." She says between her incoherent sobs.

"Maybe it's for the best. Maybe you both should plan this out?" Fabian suggests.

"NO! I can protect her and I will!" Mara says with determination.

She is my sister and I will do anything to protect her!