The words registered. The phrasing. The content. All of it. They struck like a body blow. But…
“She’s lying,” I said, not even hesitating. “He has one child. Me. If he fathered any bastards—and no I’m not calling you that,I promise. We’d know.” Grandpa Ted would know. Nana would have known.
No way in hell they’d have kept a grandchild of theirs a secret. They were too damn invested.
Frankie hesitated and it was then that I truly recognized the misery in her eyes. The pain that had been flickering in and out of her gaze. “I don’t think she was lying. He was standing right there and he was really excited. Then she got…well, Mom and I had a fight.”
The lack of further explanation had me narrowing my eyes. “Did she hit you?”
The woman had done it before. We’d seen the evidence of it before.
“It was just a slap.” Frankie waved that off. The bitch slapped Frankie and Edward probably just stood there. She hurried on like it wasn’t important. “The point is, she said that your dad is mine too—that we’re—you and me—we’re siblings.”
“Bull. Shit.” I fired both words like bullets, and when she would have pulled away, I tightened my hand on hers. “No way in hell, Frankie. You are not my sister. I amnotyour brother. Just not possible.”
At her distressed look, I gave into the desire I’d had since I got in the car. I took her coffee and mine and set them in the cupholders, reached down and shoved her seat back before I unbuckled her and lifted right over into my lap.
She didn’t fight me, thank fuck, and when I had her in my arms I cupped her cheek.
“We’re not related,” I told her. “No way in hell. Babe, I know what my paternal side of the family looks like and you have green eyes. Really beautiful green eyes. Edward and I both have verybrowneyes.”
“Mom has green eyes.”
“Don’t care,” I said. “No one in three generations on Edward’s side of the family has anything resembling blue or green. All brown. He doesn’t have a green or blue recessive to match with Maddy’s. You aren’t his.”
She blinked at me slowly.
“You remember studying Mendel’s genetics in biology, right?” It wasn’t her favorite subject, but she’d done well.
“Yes.” Her gaze cut to the side, a frown tightening her brow.
Sliding my hand from her cheek to her hair, I stroked my fingers through it. The violet was really lovely. A bit of a contrast to her green eyes, but it worked well with the blonde.
“Coding for eyes or skin, it’s mostly a fifty-fifty thing from the genes you get from each parent. So, in order to have green eyes, both parents need to have that recessive so that it can combine, even if one of them has brown eyes.”
“Because if there’s no recessive on one side…”
“Exactly. I can do some research, but Edward has brown eyes. My grandfather does and so did my nana. Pretty damn certain both of my great-grandparents on both sidesalsohad dark eyes. The pigment comes from how much melanin you have. Brown eyes have a lot more melanin. It’s dominant to the gene that expresses as blue or green because you have a lotlessmelanin with that one.”
Her teeth scraped over her lower lip.
“You arenotmy sister.” I had never meant something so fiercely in my life. I would never accept the idea that she was. “I don’t care if Edward banged every woman from here to Manhattan. You look just like your mother, but that means whoever your father was, hehadto have had that recessive gene.”
“But what if it goes back even further…” The quiet desperation in her voice scraped me bloody. “You just said it wasrecessive. What if there was no chance to express it before he and my mom…”
Wetness stung her eyes and made my heart fist.
I was going to kill Edward for this.
“Babe…”
“You can’t say for sure though. Neither of us can.”
Seriously going to kill himandher mother.
“You’re not my sister, Frankie.”
“You don’t?—”
