by Brenda Novak
“If word got out, it would’ve cost him his job,” Serenity said.
“But he’d be more likely to tell his brother, wouldn’t he?” Lorelei asked.
Serenity shook her head. “My father would’ve gone to the police or the press. I know him—and so does Vance. I can see why he didn’t do that.”
“If this is all true, we’re the product of...what? Rape?” Lorelei was still trying to grasp it all.
“This doesn’t read like it was forced,” Sawyer replied. “Father Greenstone got into relationships with these girls.”
“So it was statutory rape.”
“Looks that way.”
Lorelei’s eyebrows slid up. “That’s what connects us?”
Serenity touched her arm. As shocked and sad as she was for herself, she felt worse for Lorelei. Lorelei hadn’t had a Chuck and Charlotte to take over and raise her. She hadn’t even had a Rosalind. “It does explain everything—why Reagan’s mother never told her she was adopted, and why my mother didn’t tell me.”
“A lot of children know they were adopted and don’t know anything about their birth parents,” Lorelei said.
“Maybe my mother didn’t know,” Reagan said. “My father could’ve arranged it.”
“That’s possible,” Serenity allowed. “But even if she did know, I’m betting she couldn’t tell you. So many adopted children try to find their birth parents. If I was the church, I’d make non-disclosure a stipulation.”
Lorelei took the paper that had the copy of the newspaper article. “But...who could’ve sent this?”
Serenity showed her the envelope. “According to the cancellation on the stamp it was mailed from San Francisco last week. That was what made me think it came from the Alstons and must be an attack on Sawyer and me. They live in the Bay Area.”
“Maybe your uncle Vance sent it to you,” Reagan said.
“What would he be doing in the Bay Area?” Lorelei asked.
Serenity was about to say she didn’t know, when the answer hit her so hard she jumped out of her chair. “My father!”
“Your father?” Lorelei echoed. “What would make you think it was him?”
“He was in the Bay Area on business last week. His office used to be in San Francisco. My mother mentioned that he went up to meet with an old client, but it was just for the day, so he never said anything about it himself. He probably doesn’t even know I was aware of the trip.”
“You asked your father to take a DNA test. Could he have begun to suspect that you know you’re not his?” Sawyer asked.
Lorelei looked confused. “Wait. I thought he didn’t know about the secret to begin with.”
“He must’ve figured it out,” Serenity said. “Or my mother finally told him, possibly years later, after Greenstone was already in prison.”
“That makes sense,” Sawyer said. “Your parents have been together for a long time. He must know by now. And I can’t imagine he’d want you to find out that you were adopted without having you understand why they didn’t tell you—that they were keeping the terms of their agreement while also trying to protect you from the stigma.”
“But he doesn’t want to start a big thing in the family right now, with my brother’s wedding coming up,” Serenity agreed.
“Yes. Think about it,” Reagan said. “This leaves the knowledge in your hands. You can decide if you want to tell Beau and the twins or not. Hard as it is to learn that we came from such a terrible set of circumstances, the way your father handled it is very classy. He knew you were beginning to question, and he relieved your need to know without involving anyone else, without opening a dialogue that could tear your whole family apart.”
“But why wouldn’t he just pull you aside and have a talk with you?” Lorelei asked.
“In case I’m not questioning. If I didn’t know, I wouldn’t understand what this article means. I’d toss it, and that would be the end of it. It’s not as if I came out and asked him. I acted as though nothing had changed.”
“Maybe it’s not him,” Sawyer said.
Tears gathered in Serenity’s eyes, making it difficult to read when she pulled out her phone and scrolled down her list of favorites for her dad’s name. She knew in her heart it was him, but she had to be sure.
“What are you doing?” Lorelei asked in alarm.
She sniffed as she struggled to hold back her emotions. “Double-checking.”
They all watched with worried expressions, as though she was disarming a bomb. She supposed she was disarming a bomb—an emotional one. But she had to know if the answers they’d come up with were the truth.
Thank you for the article, she texted.
She could tell they were all holding their breath as they awaited his response.
When it came, the tears filling Serenity’s eyes spilled down her cheeks. Her father didn’t say a word about the article or why he’d done what he’d done. He said: I have always loved you, and I will always love you. How you came into my life means nothing to me. I’m just glad you’re here.
After a few seconds, she said, “It was the priest. We are the result of three different women being victimized by the same man.”
Reagan plopped down on the couch. “Shit.”
“Wow. We knew so little for so long. And now...” Lorelei shook her head. “I have no idea how to feel.”
“Neither do I,” Serenity said. “It wasn’t the answer we were hoping for, but at least we know.” She felt Sawyer rubbing her back as her sisters came over to embrace her.
* * *
lorelei
The last weeks of summer were spent accepting the most probable story she could construct of her birth and adjusting to that knowledge. She’d wanted to know where she came from, even if it was hard to hear, and now she felt she did. There was a certain peace in having even a small amount of resolution. But she still wondered what’d happened to the poor girl who’d been her birth mother, whether the priest who’d gotten into a relationship with her was still in prison, and who had adopted her. If her story was the same as Reagan’s and Serenity’s, where were her adoptive parents when she’d been found wandering in the street?
She was tempted to go back to the adoption agency and demand they give her more information. If she’d been adopted and it had happened through that agency, they must have an entire file on her.
But she doubted it would do her any good. When she’d driven down the last time, they’d been polite but immovable. And she was so busy working, taking care of Lucy and enjoying Tahoe—while dreading the moment she would have to return to Florida and confront Mark and Francine and her divorce—that she didn’t want to spend the last of her time being unsatisfied.
She promised herself she would hire a private detective as soon as she had the money and find out for sure. Now that she could provide a PI with a likely place to start, he or she should be able find out more.
But right now she’d be grateful for what she had—some information and the love and support of her two sisters. At least they’d figured out how they’d come to be related. She’d be able to unravel the rest with time—she hoped. Maybe she’d find out she had even more siblings. She, Reagan and Serenity had certainly discussed the possibility.
On her last day of work, she was eager to pick up Lucy and head to the lake. She hated that she had to fly home on Sunday—only three days from now—but it was time.
The manager and the other employees at the Blue Bayou had purchased a farewell cake and some balloons to let her know they were going to miss her. That was so thoughtful, she was still smiling and thinking about how much she hated to leave this place and everyone she’d met here when she walked out of the restaurant.
She’d been riding Serenity’s bike to avoid tying up their only car, so she was surprised to see the X5 idling in the parking lot with both Serenity and Reagan insid
e it.
“What’s going on?” she asked the second she opened the back door.
“Throw your bike on the rack,” Serenity said. “We’re taking you to dinner.”
“Where’s Lucy?”
Reagan rolled down her window. “She’s swimming with Finn, so she’s in good hands.”
“But...I’m in my uniform. If we’re going out, shouldn’t I go home and change?”
“This isn’t that kind of night. We have something we want to talk to you about. We were thinking we’d just get a burger and a shake at The Burger Shack. Do you mind going in your uniform?”
“Not to The Burger Shack.” Feeling slightly anxious about what her sisters might have to say, she loaded her bike and climbed into the back seat. “What do you want to talk about?”
Neither Serenity nor Reagan spoke right away. “We’ll tackle that when we get there, okay?” Serenity said at length.
Lorelei’s excitement over the party her coworkers had thrown her dimmed as they drove to The Burger Shack, placed their order and found an outdoor table that was well away from where anyone else was sitting. “You two are so somber,” she said. “You’re scaring me.”
Reagan scooted forward. “I’m sorry. We don’t mean to scare you. It’s just...well, we tried to do something nice for you and...we were successful, in a way. But we aren’t quite sure how you’ll react.”
“The last thing we want to do is make anything worse for you,” Serenity added.
“I believe that,” Lorelei said. “So what’s this about?”
Reagan nudged Serenity. “You explain.”
“It’s about your adoptive mother,” Serenity said.
Lorelei sat up straighter. “Don’t tell me you’ve found her!”
They exchanged another glance. Again, it was Serenity who spoke. “We have. Sort of.”
“How?”
“I asked my father to talk to Vance.”
“And—”
“That was a dead end. Vance didn’t handle your adoption. He couldn’t tell us anything. But it made my father eager to help, and he hired a private investigator who’s uncovered a few key pieces of information.”
“You’re kidding! That’s so kind of you. I don’t even know what to say.”
“We’re happy to help. But...about what he found.”
“What is it?” she asked.
Reagan jumped back in. “Only eighteen months after Bernard Greenstone—the priest who...did what he did to our birth mothers—was sent to Cincinnati, the church relocated him again.”
“Not to Florida...”
“No, they sent him to Mississippi, where he was finally arrested. That’s where he used his position to prey on the youngest of his victims.”
Lorelei’s whole body began to tingle. “Which means...what?”
“It means that he impregnated another girl while he was there. It might even have been her parents who blew the whistle on him, although we haven’t been able to verify that.”
“So was I adopted? Is that where it happened?” Lorelei asked, grasping at the hope this information implied.
“Yes,” Serenity said. “And the PI my father hired managed to get the names of your adoptive parents.”
“No way!”
Serenity had won the lottery with her parents. Lorelei couldn’t believe how lucky she’d been—but at least Lorelei had won the lottery when it came to sisters. “Who were my adoptive parents?”
“Their names were Mitch and Sarah Ryan.”
Names! Information, at last! “And? Do you know anything about them?”
“A little,” Serenity replied. “They divorced thirty-one years ago, only a year or so after they adopted you. The PI can’t find your father. He thinks he returned to Canada, where he was from.”
The burgers, fries and shakes were ready, but Lorelei could barely hear the teenager calling out, “Alston?” Serenity and Reagan didn’t react, either, so he brought the food to them.
Ignoring the interruption, Serenity caught Lorelei’s hands and held them tight. “Your adoptive mother was murdered, Lorelei. The PI found an article about her body being discovered by a nature enthusiast in a swamp in Florida.”
Murdered... It sounded like something that could only happen on TV. “Who killed her?”
“No one knows,” Reagan said. “The case has never been solved.”
“But why couldn’t they—the cops—ever connect me to her?”
“She’d just moved there. She was so new no one realized she had a child. When she was murdered, you must’ve gotten out of the house somehow. The killer might even have let you out. That’s why you were found wandering in the street, and why your mother and father never searched for you.”
Lorelei sat in stunned silence. “Didn’t I have grandparents?” she asked when she could speak.
“We don’t know yet,” Serenity said. “But I’m guessing you didn’t—at least not grandparents who were alive and well or invested in their daughter’s life at that point.”
“The police claim they did what they could to find your mother’s killer, but there were no good leads,” Reagan said.
“Her body wasn’t found until you would’ve been six,” Serenity added, picking up from there. “By then there were just bones. It’s no wonder the two incidents—a lost child and a murdered woman—were never connected.”
Lorelei sat numbly. Her mother hadn’t abandoned her? That thought brought such tremendous relief, and an upwelling of warmth, as though someone had wrapped her in a blanket.
But she was shocked and hurt that some stranger could rob her of the life she might’ve had.
It wasn’t until a tear dropped off her chin that she realized she was crying.
“I bet she loved you as much as you love Lucy.”
When Reagan said that, Lorelei closed her eyes and let those words soothe the hurt. “I was lucky to have survived,” she said. “My poor mother.”
“It’s so sad, what happened to her,” Reagan agreed.
“How did the private investigator find what he did?” Lorelei asked.
“He wrote a letter to Father Greenstone, for one.”
“The priest is still alive?”
“He’s still in prison but—and this is a chilling thought—he’s scheduled to get out next year.”
“I can’t say I’m looking forward to knowing he’s out there, walking around. Will either of you go see him?”
“Not me,” Reagan said.
Serenity shook her head. “I have nothing to say to him, either.”
“What about your father?” Reagan asked. “Will you try to find him?”
She took a moment to mull it over, to imagine what it might be like to locate Mitch Ryan. Would it even be possible? Was he still in Canada? Would he be happy to hear from her? He’d been part of her life for such a short time. But he might be able to tell her more about Sarah, and her thirst for answers was still strong. “I might.”
“Maybe he’ll give you information if nothing else,” Serenity said as though reading her mind.
“Yes.” The smell of the food finally registered, and Lorelei stuffed a French fry in her mouth. “It’s good to know all this,” she said once she’d swallowed. “What you’ve both done—and your father, too, Serenity. That you’d all go to so much trouble and expense is beyond generous.” Although her voice softened with emotion, she tried to keep it as strident as possible. “Thank you.”
Reagan’s eyes grew glassy from unshed tears. “You’re worth it,” she mumbled.
“I’m just sorry we couldn’t learn more,” Serenity added. “But at least this is a start.”
Reagan pulled her burger in front of her. “There’s one more thing...”
Lorelei, hungrier than she’d realized, grabbed her burger, too. “What is it?”
Serenity took a drink of her shake before meeting Lorelei’s eyes. “With your permission, I’d like to write our story.”
“Seriously? You mean like...it’ll be your next book?”
“If you’re okay with that. I already talked to my editor, and she was very interested, because I’d have such a unique perspective.”
“And since you just turned in All Gone, you’re available.”
“Exactly.”
“That’s wonderful! Of course it’s fine with me. Maybe...maybe you’ll be able to dig up more.” The few details she’d learned answered questions she’d had her whole life, but they also raised more.
“That’s what I’m hoping, too. I know how much you must want to know what really happened to your mother. I can’t promise my involvement will amount to a whole lot, but I’ll do everything I can to convince the police to reopen the file. Who knows? Maybe with the advances they’ve made in DNA testing, they’ll be able to find your adoptive mother’s killer one day.”
Although Lorelei was happy, she was also close to tears. “Just hearing you say that gives me goose bumps.”
epilogue
reagan
IT WAS A COLD, snowy day in New York when Reagan’s water broke. The baby was coming, but she was ready. She had her nursery all prepared, and both Serenity and Lorelei had come to town for the birth—Serenity from Berkeley, although she’d sold her house there and now lived with Sawyer, and Lorelei from Florida. Mark had Lucy this week, so Reagan wouldn’t get to see her little niece, whom she missed so much, but she figured that was for the best since it would’ve been hard to have Lucy at the hospital.
“Are you doing okay?” Serenity fed her ice chips. The doctor wouldn’t allow her to have anything else.
“No,” she said bluntly. The labor pains were getting stronger. She was beginning to understand just how difficult this process was going to be. “Tell me again that it’ll all be over soon,” she said to Lorelei.
