Chapter 10 - Saint Agnes
The building that had once housed Saint Agnes Maternity Clinic was now a rehabilitation center.
Its redbrick exterior had been renovated.
The gardens were newer.
The brass lettering above the entrance had disappeared.
But Helen Price remembered the place exactly as it had been.
Tessa met her in a quiet room at Helen's retirement community.
Elena accompanied her.
Damian had offered to drive them.
Tessa declined.
He accepted her decision.
Helen sat beside the window wearing a lavender cardigan.
When Tessa entered, the old nurse covered her mouth.
"Oh, my goodness."
Tessa stopped.
"What?"
Helen stared at her.
"You have Margaret's eyes."
Tessa sat slowly.
"You knew my mother?"
Helen nodded.
"She was a good woman."
Tessa felt tears gather.
"Then please tell me what happened."
Helen looked at Elena.
Elena said, "You can tell us what you personally remember. It's all right if you don't know everything."
Helen took a breath.
"Your mother worked in records. She discovered missing consent forms, inconsistent dates, and babies whose discharge paperwork didn't match the mothers' records."
Tessa gripped her chair.
"Did she report it?"
"She tried."
"To whom?"
"The clinic administrator. Then a lawyer. I don't know what happened after that."
Helen folded her hands.
"A few months later, Margaret began caring for a little girl. She told me the child's mother had disappeared and the legal placement was complicated."
Tessa felt her pulse quicken.
"Was that me?"
"I believe so."
"Was Margaret my real mother?"
Helen's eyes filled with sadness.
"I don't know, sweetheart."
The room seemed to shrink.
Tessa stared at the floor.
All her life, she had known exactly who she was.
Margaret Miller's daughter.
Emily's older sister.
A girl who'd grown up eating peanut-butter sandwiches because money was scarce.
Now a stranger was telling her that even her beginning might belong to somebody else.
"What about Beatrice Costa?" Elena asked.
Helen nodded.
"She spent weeks trying to locate that child. Beatrice believed the little girl had been abandoned. She wanted to raise her."
"Why didn't she?"
"Her husband opposed it. He said the child's presence could expose the clinic's records and damage the family."
Tessa looked up.
"Did Beatrice ever hold me?"
Helen hesitated.
"If you're the child I'm remembering, yes."
Tessa swallowed.
"Was she kind?"
Helen smiled faintly.
"She sang to you."
Something broke inside Tessa.
Not because of the mystery.
Because somewhere in her earliest life, a woman she now spoon-fed oatmeal had once held her and sung.
She pressed a hand to her mouth.
Elena moved closer.
"We can stop."
Tessa shook her head.
"There's something else."
Helen looked at her.
"My mother wrote that she was trying to save me. From what?"
Helen stared at the table.
"That was the question we were all afraid to ask."
Outside, rain began tapping against the windows.
Tessa felt suddenly exhausted.
She wanted Emily.
Not an attorney.
Not a billionaire.
Not another document.
She wanted her little sister sitting beside her, making terrible jokes until the world felt manageable again.
But Emily was gone.
And whatever truth existed, Tessa would have to face it without her.
That evening, she returned to the estate.
Damian found her in the library, sitting on the floor beside a stack of old books.
"How did it go?"
She laughed once.
"Apparently my entire childhood might have started with a lie."
He remained standing a few feet away.
"Do you want me to leave?"
"No."
He sat on the floor opposite her.
The sight was so unexpected she almost smiled.
A man in an expensive suit, sitting cross-legged on a library carpet.
"You look ridiculous," she said.
"I've been told."
"By who?"
"Usually people who didn't live long enough to repeat it."
She stopped smiling.
Damian immediately regretted the remark.
"That was a poor joke."
"Was it a joke?"
He didn't answer.
Tessa studied him.
"I know who you are, Damian."
He looked at her.
"Do you?"
"I know what people say."
"People say many things."
"Some of them are true."
He nodded.
"Yes."
For a while, neither spoke.
Then Tessa asked, "Why are you helping me?"
He could have said it was because of his mother.
Or the threats.
Or guilt over investigating her family.
All of those things were true.
But they weren't enough.
"Because you saw my mother when everyone else saw a problem," he said.
Tessa looked down.
"She's a person."
"I know that now."
"You should've known it before."
"I should have."
She looked at him for a long time.
Then she whispered, "I don't know who my father was."
Damian didn't move.
"I don't even know whether the people who raised me were my parents."
Her voice cracked.
"And the worst part is that my mom isn't here to explain."
Damian reached toward her.
Then stopped.
"May I?"
Tessa looked at his hand.
After a moment, she placed hers in it.
It was a small gesture.
Nothing more.
But Damian felt it more intensely than any victory he'd ever won.
His phone vibrated.
Paul.
He ignored it.
It vibrated again.
Then a third time.
Tessa withdrew her hand.
"You should answer."
Damian glanced at the screen.
Paul's message contained one sentence.
Salvatore has requested an emergency meeting with the family's senior associates. He's claiming you're mentally unfit to lead.
Damian stood.
The softness vanished from his face.
Tessa watched the transformation.
"What happened?"
"Business."
She recognized the word.
May you like
In Damian's world, it was a locked door.
And this time, she wasn't sure she wanted to know what stood behind it.
