Lily Rose

by Deborah Robinson

  “But she led you to me.” Eric’s grip on her hand was warm and firm. “You have me now.”

  “Do I?”

  “Lily,” Eric said slowly, “this is a lot for anyone to take in. In the back of my mind, I guess I always knew this was a possibility, that my child with Jeff—that you—were out there and would find me. But I’ve never told my wife or children what happened when I was only a teenager. I owe it to them to let them know when the time is right. And right now . . . things are a bit difficult. I need to ask for your patience.”

  “You wouldn’t be ashamed to tell them about me?” Lily whispered.

  “About you? Lily,” Eric held her gaze with his own, “I’m not like Jeff. I won’t say that we can be a proper family now, but you won’t be alone. Not anymore.”

  “Thank you, Eric. Thank you.” Lily lowered her eyes, not wanting him to see the tears in them. When she lifted them, she saw reflected in his own the same feeling, blue against blue, like the ocean.

  Eric had a train to catch. When they stood up, not knowing what to do, Lily extended her hand again. This time, Eric pulled her into his arms, and she buried her head against his shoulder, holding onto the warmth and strength of him for a moment before releasing him with some reluctance. Of course she and Jeff had never touched when they’d met; before that, she’d fantasized about being held by her biological mother, by someone who shared the blood that ran in her veins. She’d never imagined that it would be her biological father with whom she’d have that moment.

  “I’ll be in touch,” Eric told her, and then he walked away.

  As when he’d arrived, the other hotel guests turned to watch his departure. Not being close enough to have heard the real story, they could only look at Lily’s tear-streaked face and assume that she’d been jilted.

  Lily sat down again, the tea cold and the food unappetizing, but her entire being was awash in emotion. For the first time since she’d returned to New York, she felt a sense of real hope.

  * * *

  On the train ride back to Bedford, Eric’s head swirled with thoughts running as fast as the scenery that passed by his window. He’d kept a calm face for Lily’s sake, and part of him was still in disbelief over what she had told him, but now that he’d had a couple of hours to digest the news, it was beginning to hit him in a completely different way.

  That Lily was his daughter, he had no doubt. He didn’t need a DNA test to prove it. He knew there must have been some reason he had been so drawn to her during their photo shoot, why he’d wanted to follow her in the media. Her eyes, he realized upon seeing them again, were the same color as his, the same as his mother’s. Even her name . . . Jeff must have had Lillian Langvin in mind when she’d signed the birth certificate. While Lily didn’t look much like Jeff, or even himself, Eric could see the physical similarities between her and his mother, in her fine facial features and the elegance of her figure. More so, she uncannily resembled Mary, his sister who had died in a skiing accident at the age of twelve. If Mary had lived, he thought, she would have grown up to look just like Lily.

  Lily Rose was his daughter . . . but how could he be a father to her? He could hardly be a father to his own daughters, he thought; look at what had happened to Emily. Certainly, Lily was grown and did not need the kind of guidance that a teenager did, but she needed him for something. He recalled their parting embrace, the way she’d clung to him so fiercely. She had admitted to him that she had no one left she could turn to. She needed him for family. It was a cry for help that he simply could not reject.

  And then, there was the matter of his own family. No matter what kind of relationship he and Lily Rose would have, his wife would need to know first.

  Before Eric could think more about this, he was already at the Bedford train station. He had asked Gabriella to pick him up, and he could see their car idling at the curb. Squaring his shoulders, he walked over to it and got into the passenger seat.

  “Can you pull into the parking lot?” he asked Gabriella, after giving her a quick kiss.

  “Sure.” After she had cut the engine, she asked, “What’s going on?”

  Eric looked at her for a moment, as beautiful as she had been when he’d first met her at Claudio’s restaurant in Rome. He knew how big her heart was, taking on an awkward foreigner who expected to make a living from taking pictures, even following him to another country. So he told her everything, from meeting Jeff, to her coming to Connecticut to tell him she was pregnant, and his father paying her to give up her baby for adoption. This was the part that he had not been able to tell Lily, that a financial transaction was why she had been put up for adoption. But now he did not hide the fact that he had taken no responsibility, had been relieved that his family’s money had been able to make the problem disappear. While the conditions of Jeff’s contract had been that she never contact the Langvins again, there had been no clause about him contacting her. The truth was that he hadn’t wanted to see Jeff again, to find out what had happened to her and their child. He had just wanted everything to go away, and it had . . . for thirty-six years.

  “But I can’t ignore it anymore,” Eric said. “Not after what’s happened to our daughter, and now that Lily Rose has come to me.”

  During the entire time he had been talking, Gabriella had been silent, staring ahead through the windshield at the reflection of the streetlights that had started to go on in the parking lot. Now she turned to him, her dark eyes full of sorrow and compassion.

  “There’s only one thing you can do,” she said.

  “What’s that?”

  “You have to invite her to dinner.”

  Chapter 22

  LILY ROSE STOOD AT THE end of a driveway nestled in the deep woods of eastern Connecticut. At its end was Eric Langvin’s house, but for some reason she was reluctant to get any closer. She needed to take a moment to gather her thoughts about what meeting his family meant to her. So much had happened in the past several weeks that she couldn’t believe she was standing here, about to enter a world that she had long thought was denied her.

  After leaving the St. Regis Hotel, she had tried to rein in her anticipation for what might happen next. While Eric’s response to the news that she was his daughter had gone as well as could be expected, she didn’t know how long it would be before he contacted her again. He had said he needed time to talk to his wife and daughters, and she respected that. Above all, she trusted Eric—she knew that he was a man of his word, that he was a kind man, that he was a good husband and father. She knew his family came first, and she would never want to do anything to jeopardize his relationship with them.

  It was difficult, however, for her to not think about them, especially his daughters. For so long she had focused solely on the idea of meeting her birth mother, and then, when she’d learned of his identity, her birth father. Only then did she consider the fact that she had other, living relatives. With Jeff it was a dead end, in more ways than one. But Eric’s two daughters were her half sisters. Growing up as an only child, Lily had longed for a brother or sister; it was, in part, why her parents had allowed her to have so many pets. Many times she’d listened to friends talk about their siblings and envied their closeness, especially the bond between sisters. While she knew Eric’s daughters were young, more age-appropriate to be her nieces, she couldn’t wait to meet them.

  So she was surprised and overjoyed when Eric contacted her a few days after their meeting to say that he’d told his family about her and that his wife had invited her to dinner the following week. Standing at the end of the Langvins’ driveway now, Lily tightened her grip on the bouquet of flowers she’d brought, squared her shoulders, and walked forward.

  A converted farmhouse sat at the end of the driveway, framed by the last rays of the setting sun filtering in through the surrounding birch and maple trees. A lot of care had obviously gone into the restoration of its softly weathered red plank walls, gray-shingled roof, and front door with glass panels. It looked warm and i
nviting, the perfect place to raise a family. Lily could see why someone like Eric might want to leave the bustle of the city for a quiet residence like this—the pull of nature and solitude that she herself had always felt.

  At her knock, Eric opened the door and asked her to come in. As she hesitated at the threshold, she saw a small, dark-haired woman with a pretty smile come down the hallway. She knew at once that it was Gabriella, Eric’s wife, but before she could say anything, she found herself pulled into an embrace with an intensity she would not have expected from someone so slight.

  Gabriella drew back to look at her. “Welcome, Lily,” she said in a lilting, faintly accented voice. “I am so happy to finally meet you.”

  “It’s nice to meet you, too.” As she spoke, Lily couldn’t help looking over Gabriella’s shoulder.

  Knowing what she was looking for, Eric said, “Emily is picking up Chloe from her dance lesson. You’ll meet them soon enough. In the meantime, let me show you around.”

  Lily followed him through the high-ceilinged living room with its exposed wooden beams and into his study.

  “I thought you might like to see this,” Eric said, gesturing toward a framed photo on the wall.

  She knew without being told that this was a photo of his family when he was young: Eric’s image beamed from roughly the center of the print, while around him stood a tall man, an icily beautiful woman, a boy that looked like a slightly older version of himself, and a girl with braids. Everyone was gleamingly blond and appeared, at least at this point in time, to be happy. Without being asked, Eric started to talk about them, how strict his father was, how sporty and loving his mother. His brother, Christopher, was highly competitive, and then there was his sister, Mary, whose death had forever driven the luster from his mother’s eyes and shaken the family apart.

  “My mother never recovered from that,” Eric said. “I don’t think my father did, either. None of us did.”

  Lily nodded, understanding how the loss of a family member had repercussions that never went away. She had endured the sudden passing of her beloved parents; she could only imagine what the death of a child must be like. “I wish I could have known your sister . . . I wish I could have known all of them.”

  “Well,” Eric said, “you’ll have the chance to meet your half sisters shortly.” He paused. “There’s something you should know about Emily. She’s five months pregnant. Ironic, I know,” he added with a dry smile.

  “What is she going to do?”

  “Adoption is our best choice at the moment. At least Gabriella thinks so, and Emily is starting to agree with her.”

  “And you?”

  “I don’t know anymore. Of course I want the best future possible for Emily, and she was set to go to college before this happened. But to give up your own child. . . .” He trailed off, unable to meet her eyes, and Lily understood the immense guilt he must have felt for so long, even if it was subconscious, for abandoning her.

  “I always wanted to have children,” Lily said quietly. “That’s what I wished for the most in life. I felt my biggest failure was not being able to become a mother.” She raised her eyes to his. “I don’t believe that there is ever an unwanted child.”

  Before Eric could respond, they could hear a car pull into the driveway, doors opening and closing, the hardwood sounds of pounding footsteps and young, bright laughter.

  “They’re here,” he said. “Let’s go into the living room.”

  Gabriella must have intercepted the girls upon their arrival, and both of them were sitting properly on the sofa when Eric and Lily entered the room. Lily could see immediately how they took after their mother, miniatures of her dark beauty and grace. Chloe’s limbs seemed barely able to contain her energy, while Emily was more sedate. Then she stood up to greet Lily, and Lily could see the curve of her bump beneath her T-shirt, contrasting wincingly with her sweet, childlike face.

  Gabriella said that dinner was ready, so they all went into the dining room, where Lily’s bouquet reigned over the center of the table in a glazed earthenware vase. Lily was also touched that the main course was a rich Tuscan white bean soup (that Chloe immediately told her was called ribollita), as she’d told Eric when he’d invited her to dinner that she was a vegetarian. The ribollita was accompanied by thick slices of fragrantly warm homemade Italian bread.

  Talk during the meal was pleasant but inconsequential: Lily asked Eric and Gabriella about their renovations to their house, while Gabriella remarked how much she enjoyed visiting the World of Lily Rose boutique. Once, when Lily brought up Red Rose Farm, Emily asked with wide eyes, “Do you really own a horse farm?”

  Remembering how Eric had told her that Emily loved horses, Lily said, “Please feel free to visit whenever you want. I think you would really like it.”

  “It’s going to be a while before you can ride again, young lady,” Gabriella interjected, looking pointedly at Emily’s stomach, and Emily subsided, face red.

  That was the only reference anyone made to Emily’s pregnancy, except when dessert was served and Emily and Chloe squabbled over who got the last slice of Gabriella’s delicious pistachio cake.

  “I should get it because I’m eating for two, silly,” Emily said, surprisingly unabashed.

  “That’s not fair!” Chloe protested. “She always gets everything! She’s even getting a baby!”

  “Hush,” Gabriella said, but Lily could only think how young Emily seemed. It was hard for her to believe that her own birth mother was this age when she was pregnant with her. How could anyone expect a teenager, even with all the support in the world, to raise a newborn baby?

  After dinner, the girls went to their rooms to do their homework, and Eric and Gabriella and Lily lingered at the table with digestifs. At one point, Lily stood up to use the bathroom and was directed upstairs. On her way back, she couldn’t help but notice that a door at the end of the hall was partly open, with light streaming from it.

  When she peered inside, she saw Emily lying on her bed, headphones on as she wrote in a notebook. Emily lifted her head at Lily’s knock and removed her headphones. “Can I come in?” Lily asked, and Emily nodded, clearing some space on her bed for Lily to sit down.

  Her room looked very much like what Lily would imagine for a horsey girl—walls covered with ribbons, shelves with trophies, and a framed picture of her on a chestnut horse. The pink horseshoe-printed coverlet on the bed looked like something that had been picked out many years earlier, and kept out of habit.

  “Is that your horse?” Lily asked, indicating the photo.

  Emily told her about falling in love with Chessy when she was twelve, and begging her parents for months to be able to have her own horse. Chessy was a Dutch warmblood, specially bred for dressage. “Do you have horses like that on your farm?” Emily wanted to know.

  “It’s mostly retired Thoroughbred racehorses now,” Lily told her, “along with a bunch of rescue dogs and cats.”

  “It sounds amazing. I wish I could go there. I want to get out of here so badly, now that everyone at school knows about this.” She rubbed her stomach with the gesture Lily had seen done by many pregnant women, and envied. Although Lily didn’t feel envy this time, just a surge of protectiveness over Emily and her unborn child.

  “I guess your father told you all about me, how he met my birth mother,” Lily started cautiously.

  “Yeah,” Emily replied. “He was seventeen like me, and it was at some party. They weren’t in love or anything.”

  “Were you in love?”

  If she were startled by the directness of this question, Emily didn’t let on. “No. I thought I was, at the time. I had never met anyone like Santi before, you know?”

  Recalling how she had felt with Finn, her first boyfriend, Lily nodded. “I do.”

  “He was the first person outside of my family that I felt like I could really be myself with.”

  “I’m guessing he’s kind of cute, too.”

  Emily laughed, the
reaction Lily was hoping for. “Yeah, he’s not too bad. Especially compared to the guys at school.”

  “Does he know about the baby?”

  Emily shook her head. “I haven’t told him yet. Dad says he has the right to know, and I guess I believe that, too. But I don’t want him to, like, come up here or anything. He’s going to school and has his own life. Whatever happens to the baby is my decision,” she said with a sudden fierceness that Lily also understood. “Not his, and not my parents’, either,”

  “What do you want to do?”

  “I guess I just want to graduate and spend the summer at the stable, and go to college in the fall. But at the same time I don’t want this baby to be adopted by just anyone and disappear from my life.” Emily looked at Lily sideways, twirling a long, curly strand of hair around her finger. “How did she do it?”

  “Who?”

  “Your mother. How did she decide who to give you to?”

  “She . . . well, my birth mother didn’t care who I ended up with. I don’t think she gave half as much thought to it as you and your parents are doing right now. It just so happened that I ended up with two wonderful parents, the best parents I could hope for. I always wanted to pass on what I learned from them to my own children, but . . . that wasn’t to be.”

  “Why not?”

  “My ex husband was . . . well, he was physically unable, and he refused to consider a sperm donor. He was against adoption, too. The strange thing is, I understood how he felt about it, because even though I was adopted, I also wanted to have a child that was biologically mine.”