“Five.”
She arched an eyebrow. “Really? Why didn’t you make contact with me, then?”
He drummed his fingers on the armrest. “Actually, I did. I sent a letter to your mother. When she responded, she told me to leave well enough alone—that the two of you were getting along just fine.” He shook his head. “I knew differently, of course.”
Katrina released a gasp. “You’ve got to be jesting. Why would she turn you away when she was so desperate for money?”
“Your mother would never allow me to talk to you. She would not allow me to even introduce myself.”
“Why do you think she acted in such a way?” Deep down, Katrina figured she already knew the answer, but it still made her stomach twist in disgust.
“Because I knew things about Lucy that she didn’t want you to know.”
Exactly!Little by little, her heart began to break. Her mother knew five years ago that Henry Landon would send them money? Yet she turned it away?
Tears burned in Katrina’s eyes, so she quickly tried to blink them away. She didn’t need to show emotion at a time like this. She didn’t want her father to think he had won. “Tell me, Henry, how were you able to get a letter to us this time?”
His wrinkled mouth turned up into a smile. “I finally decided to address the letter to you, and not your mother.”
She fisted her hands in her lap. “Nothing makes sense. When I received that letter and showed it to my mother, she told me it was high time you contacted me. She convinced me that we needed to take your money and travel to Macapá to collect more funds that were mine because I was your daughter.” She heaved a deep breath. “If my mother didn’t want me meeting you because you might have information about her, why did she decide we needed to do as your letter suggested?”
“I can only assume it was because she didn’t want you to find out that I had tried to contact you before. She wanted to continue to make me look like the terrible parent who neglected their only child.”
Another gasp sprang from her throat, and she rose to her feet. “But you were!Youwere the one who didn’t stay married to her just because youthoughtI could have been someone else’s child.Youwere the one who didn’t try harder to support your child who starved many nights because my mother was too poor to buy us food. It was because of you that my mother made me steal food in the marketplace on many occasions. Forgive me, but in my mind, that does in fact make you the neglectful parent.”
Silence stretched in the room for a few awkward moments before he hung his head. As she tried to calm her temper—and her racing heart—she studied him as closely as she could through the shadows, and she noticed that his throat jumped.
“Yes, you are right,” he said low. “I have made many mistakes in my life, and I have regretted every one of them.” Slowly, his gaze lifted to hers. “And that is why I wish to make amends. I wish to show you that I do care about you. And I wish to show you that although you believe your mother to be the saint in this situation, she is indeed just opposite.”
“Why?” Katrina fisted her hands by her side. “Because she did all she could to make sure there was food on the table and a roof over her daughter’s head, even if it meant doing something immoral?”
“No, it’s because she hasn’t changed at all, Katrina. She was a harlot when I married her, just like she is one now.”
“You don’t know that.” Anger pulsed through her, making her headache pound harder.
“Oh, I think I do.” He leaned closer, his hands grasping the edge of the armrest. “The time I’d sent my solicitor to your home to have him take you shopping for clothes, he told your mother that the money was for you and you alone. Would you like to know what your mother did when she heard that?”
Katrina really didn’t want to hear, but for some reason, she couldn’t form the words on her tongue to stop him.
“She made him a proposition. She told him that the only way my man could take you shopping was if she received a few gowns as well. She told him that she wouldrewardhim for his kindness.”
“How do you know all of this?” she asked in a small voice, her chest aching from the crushing blows of knowing that her mother was so calculating.
“My solicitor sent me a telegram.”
Confusion filled Katrina. “Why wouldn’t you just give my mother some of that money? Don’t you think she deserved even a little?”
“The money I sent was for my daughter, and her alone. Because your mother had turned me away from seeing my daughter all those years, I didn’t want her getting anything from me, but the only way she would allow you have it was if she got some herself.”
Tears spiked Katrina’s eyes again, but this time she didn’t try to blink them gone. “Then I must apologize for my mother’s behavior.” Her voice cracked.
“Do not apologize for that woman. She isnotyour responsibility.”
“Actually, she is. After all, she is the only parent who saw the need to take care of me.”
“And for that, I’m truly sorry.”
“My mother may have not been the most exemplary parent, but I believe she raised me the best that she could under the circumstances.”
