I could not move.
Claire stood slowly.
“Sit down.”
I remained standing.
“Say it again.”
She swallowed.
“Jake is not Damon’s biological son.”
The words sounded impossible.
I shook my head.
“You don't know that.”
“I do.”
“How?”
“Because Damon told me.”
“When?”
“Years ago.”
“Why would he tell you?”
Claire looked away.
“Because he wanted something from me.”
“What?”
“My silence.”
I stared at her.
“What was he afraid you would say?”
“That the child wasn't his.”
My hands began to shake.
“Who is Jake's father?”
Claire closed her eyes.
“I don't know.”
I felt relief and terror at the same time.
“You said you knew.”
“I know who Damon believed the father was.”
“Who?”
She looked at me.
“Your father's closest friend.”
The name came out quietly.
“Robert Hale.”
I sat down.
Robert.
My father's business partner.
A man who had been at my wedding.
A man who had held Jake when he was born.
A man who had sent Christmas cards every year.
A man who died when Jake was twelve.
I looked at Claire.
“You're saying Robert was Jake's father?”
“No.”
She shook her head.
“I’m saying Damon believed he was.”
I pressed both hands against my temples.
“This doesn't make sense.”
“It will.”
Claire went to the cabinet.
She returned with a folder.
Inside were copies of documents.
Damon's first divorce papers.
Medical records.
A letter.
A photograph.
I recognized the photograph immediately.
It showed Damon, Claire, and a newborn baby.
The baby was wrapped in a pale yellow blanket.
I stared at the child's face.
The photograph was old and faded.
But something about the baby's eyes made my stomach turn.
“Is that Jake?”
Claire nodded.
“No.”
She pointed toward the back of the photograph.
There was a handwritten date.
The same date as Jake's birth.
I looked at her.
“Then whose baby is this?”
“Damon thought it was his.”
I shook my head.
“But if you were pregnant with his child—”
“I wasn't.”
I stopped.
Claire sat beside me.
“The pregnancy belonged to someone else.”
“Robert?”
“I don't know.”
“Then why did Damon think it was Robert?”
“Because Robert knew about the pregnancy.”
I stared at her.
“Why?”
Claire's eyes filled with tears.
“Because he was the one who helped me.”
“Helped you with what?”
She didn't answer immediately.
Then she said, “Leaving Damon.”
I remembered my father's letter.
His warning.
The secrecy.
The private investigator.
The insistence that I ask why Claire disappeared.
Suddenly, the pieces were shifting.
My father had known Claire.
Robert had known Claire.
Damon had known.
My mother had known about Marissa.
Everyone had carried fragments of the truth.
Except me.
“Why didn't anyone tell me?”
Claire looked at me.
“Your father wanted to.”
“Then why didn't he?”
“Because Damon threatened to expose something about Robert.”
My heart stopped.
“What?”
“I don't know.”
“You do.”
Claire shook her head.
“I only know what Damon told me.”
“What did he say?”
“He said Robert had betrayed your father.”
I stared.
“Business?”
“Yes.”
“Money?”
“I think so.”
I stood.
“This has nothing to do with Jake.”
Claire looked at me.
“It has everything to do with him.”
“Why?”
“Because Damon used the accusation to make everyone afraid.”
I felt sick.
“Did Damon know Jake wasn't his?”
Claire nodded.
“He suspected from the beginning.”
“Then why did he stay?”
She looked at me with something like pity.
“Because you were pregnant.”
I shook my head.
“I was pregnant with Jake.”
“Yes.”
“And Damon knew?”
“Yes.”
“Then why marry me?”
Claire whispered, “Because your father demanded it.”
I closed my eyes.
Another piece.
Another secret.
Another decision made around me.
I had spent twenty-five years believing Damon had chosen me.
Maybe he had.
But perhaps he had chosen the life he wanted, too.
“Did Damon love Jake?”
Claire hesitated.
“I don't know.”
That answer hurt more than any other.
I sat again.
“He raised him.”
“Yes.”
“He went to every soccer game.”
“I know.”
“He taught him to drive.”
“I know.”
“He was there when Jake graduated.”
Claire nodded.
“Then how can you say he didn't love him?”
“I didn't.”
She reached for my hand.
“I said I don't know whether Damon loved him as a son or loved the life Jake represented.”
I looked at her.
“What's the difference?”
Claire's answer was quiet.
“Sometimes everything.”
I returned home after sunset.
Jake was waiting on the porch.
He stood when he saw me.
“Mom?”
I looked at my son.
The same eyes.
The same smile.
The same crooked little scar near his eyebrow from when he fell off his bicycle at nine.
I wanted to run toward him.
Instead, I stood there.
“Mom, what happened?”
I walked up the steps.
He searched my face.
“You talked to her.”
“Yes.”
“Who is she?”
I looked at him.
“Claire.”
His expression changed.
“Did she tell you about Dad?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
I sat beside him.
“Jake, there are things about your birth that I never knew.”
He became still.
“What things?”
I took his hand.
“Your father may not be your biological father.”
He stared at me.
For several seconds, he did not react.
Then he laughed once.
Not because it was funny.
Because the words were too large to understand.
“What?”
“I’m sorry.”
“No.”
He stood.
“No, Mom.”
“Jake—”
“Dad is my father.”
“I know.”
“He raised me.”
“I know.”
“He taught me everything.”
“I know.”
His voice broke.
“Then what are you telling me?”
I stood.
“I’m telling you that there are questions we deserve answers to.”
He looked at me.
“Do you believe Claire?”
“I believe she knows something.”
“Do you believe Dad?”
I thought about the photograph.
The letters.
My mother's warning.
My father's confession.
The years of silence.
“I don't know anymore.”
Jake looked away.
Then his phone rang.
He checked the screen.
His face changed.
“Who is it?”
He didn't answer.
I stepped closer.
He handed me the phone.
The message was from an unknown number.
There was only one sentence.
Stop looking into your father's past, or you will learn why Robert Hale really died.
I looked at Jake.
He looked back at me.
And for the first time that night, neither of us spoke.
Click here to continue reading: PART 9: The Message Named a Dead Man, and Before Morning We Found the One Document That Could Explain Why Everyone Had Lied
The Dress I Chose to Celebrate Fifty Years of Becoming Everyone Else Before Finally Choosing Myself
Part 8 of 10
