Page 79

She swallowed. ‘Just that?’

He nodded.

Bastard.

She went to pick up her plate but changed her mind. ‘You asked about the birth?’

He was silent.

‘It was lonely. That’s my fault, I know, but I’m just telling you how it really was. Lonely, like the rest of my life.’

Stella left her plate for him to deal with, and before she went back checked in on Sophia.

‘Asleep.’ Gina smiled.

How dare Gabe lie to her face, make out like some old English lord, when she knew damn well his parents had been wonderful? Car trips and secret fountains and hikes. His grandfather too. She thought back to that night, how they’d pored over photos and relived memories.

Then she stilled.

He’d turned the page quickly, blamed his grandfather’s grief for not looking at Beatrice, and then rubbed his eyes. Just as he had tonight when he’d lied about his parents.

‘Where’s Stella…’ came over her walkie-talkie.

‘Ten one,’ she said, which meant she was having a bathroom break, but instead she opened up a door. Maria had told her it had been Geo’s reading room…

Were the albums still here?

She’d catalogued items from the piano nobile, but here was private and had been out of bounds for staff.

She was no longer just staff though.

There were the albums, on a shelf, and she located the one in question easily, smiled a little when she saw the strict governess, and then turned the page.

Stella gasped.

Her eyes filled with tears when she saw the tiny baby with blonde curls, and what had happened the other night now made better sense.

Beatrice could be Sophia when she’d been first born.

And here, she had the same almond-shaped eyes and long slender fingers, but there were only two pages of photos for little Beatrice.

Gabe had been angry before he’d seen Sophia, justifiably cross that she hadn’t told him, though he’d been reasonable, but then she’d sat Sophia up to wind her, and it was then that things had changed…

Oh, Gabe.

It hadn’t been his grandfather who couldn’t deal with the grief of Beatrice, but Gabe himself.

Stella found out what it meant to have your heart torn in two.

One piece belonged to Gabe, seriously ached for the boy who had been trapped with his sister, who simply refused to open himself again to love.

The other piece belonged to Sophia.

And it had to be the bigger piece, the most important piece, because she would not have a child growing up in a world where they felt unwanted and unloved…

Not for a moment.

Then she amended.