Charlotte had never heard of it. It was half a world away, in a foreign country. And this sister—
“No,” she said aloud. She was not the person Mr. Heidelman was looking for. She needed to write back immediately, say she was terribly sorry about the girl’s plight, but she’d been born to Penny McCord, who’d grown up in Orange County, been a D-1 collegiate tennis player, coached for her alma mater for ten years and then, later, gave lessons at the club while married to Don Williams, a hedge fund manager who also came from affluent parents. The attorney needed to look elsewhere for Lilly’s half sister, because this terrible situation had nothing to do with Charlotte Rose Williams-Jackson—minus the Jackson soon, she reminded herself.
For a second, she felt an upwelling of relief. The attorneys at Heidelman had made a mistake. That had to be it. But she was off-balance enough to carry the letter out to the living room, where her father was watching television.
He glanced up with a look of expectation on his face when he heard her. “I thought you were going to start writing.”
“I was,” she said. “But I decided to go through the mail I picked up at the Malibu house first.”
He muted the TV. “Don’t tell me there are divorce papers in there.”
“No.”
“A letter from Cliff, reneging on the prenup?” he asked, trying again.
“No.” She was having trouble finding the words. How did she ask her father if he was really her father?
But he could tell something was wrong, and she didn’t want him to keep guessing, so she blurted out, “Was I adopted?”
The blood rushed from his face, telling her the letter was no mistake. She’d been tricked, or lied to, or... or encouraged to assume something to be true that wasn’t. She couldn’t say if there was anything wrong with what her parents had done. She wasn’t sure why they’d done it, or if she would’ve done the same thing in their shoes. She just knew that she felt robbed. Violated in a very personal, deeply emotional way. Because her adoptive parents had withheld the truth from her, she’d never had the chance to meet her birth mother, and now she never would. Was it fair to make that decision for her?
It didn’tfeelfair. “Dad!” she said, the word a hopeless groan as she sank onto the couch.
He came over and knelt at her feet. “Honey, who told you? Did Cliff do this to hurt you—hurt us all—by tearing our family apart? How’d he find out?”
She was so choked up she couldn’t answer. She handed him the letter, but he didn’t take it right away. His eyes remained fixed on her. He obviously didn’t want her to be crushed, but she could tell he knew she was and felt terrible about it.
Finally, he accepted the letter she held out to him.
After he read it, he closed his eyes and shook his head. “I was afraid something like this would happen. I told your mother wehadto tell you, but there was never a good time.”
“Never a good time?” she echoed. “How could that betrue? I’ve been around for nearly thirty years. Surely, you could’ve found a moment. What about when I was in fourth grade and brought home Hannah Jones, and she told meshe’dbeen adopted? I remember Mom explaining to me exactly what that meant. You were there at dinner, too.”
“I don’t remember. I just know you were thriving, like we wanted you to. We couldn’t bear the thought of doing anything that might threaten your sense of security, your happiness. We were afraid it would only make you crave something you couldn’t have. And we loved you so much we didn’t think a... technicality like DNA really mattered.”
They’d been good parents.Stellarparents. She couldn’t complain about the job they’d done raising her. But the decision they’d made... Was it better for hernotto know?
Maybe it was. But now shedidknow and knowing brought a tidal wave of pain andsomany questions. It created a hunger in her soul—a hunger to know more.
“Why did my birth mother give me up?” She was prepared for him to try to evade the question and was relieved when he didn’t. Instead, he spread his hands wide as if he’d tell her anything she wanted to know.
“She was barely eighteen when she had you, still had a year left of high school.”
“And my father? Was he another kid who was too young to take on the responsibility?”
“No. We were told he was a much older man, a neighbor from down the street who already had a family.”
“Ew!”Could this day get any worse?
Her father didn’t say anything. Apparently, he didn’t know how to respond to that, except with a frown.
“Where is he now?” she asked.
He shook his head helplessly. “We don’t know. We’ve never heard from him, and we’ve been glad about that.”
Because it had allowed them to keep her origins a secret? “And my birth mother? Sabrina? You never heard from her, either?”
“No,” he said softly.
