The villain who’d switched her at birth was the same woman who’d functioned as a grandmother to her and Dylan. Tess had taken care of them more dependably than any of Leah’s actual relatives ever had. Tess had picked up Dylan from school for years. Tess had brought Leah food when she was sick, given her gifts every birthday and Christmas. Tess and Rudy had functioned as her trustworthy babysitters.
What was it that she needed to communicate to Tess?
“It was wrong of you to switch Sophie and me.” She definitely did need to say that.
“Yes,” Tess acknowledged. “It was. Unequivocally.”
“You played God when you did that, and no one has the right to play God. Not for any reason. Regardless of what Jonathan did to Ian, Jonathan was the father I should have had.”
“I’m very sorry, Leah.”
“He and his wife could have given me . . .” Her voice broke. The depth of her emotion took her by surprise. “Stability and the chance to pursue my education, which I would have cherished.” Yet it sounded like Jonathan was a snake. So while growing up as his daughter would have granted her some advantages, there was no telling what hardships it might also have served her.
“Are you going to tell Sophie and her family what I did?”
“I haven’t decided. Imagine how they’ll feel if I do tell them. As terribly as I felt when I learned I wasn’t biologically related to Dylan.” Tears piled on Leah’s lashes. “Your actions will decimate them.”
“Are you going to turn me in to the police?” Tess asked after a time. “Or to a reporter?”
“No.”
Tess handed her a napkin. “I won’t blame you if you do.”
Leah blotted her eyes. “If I tell Sophie and her family the truth, I can’t say how they’ll respond to you. But I’m not interested in bringing you down. You took your revenge, but I won’t be taking mine.”
Tess’s composure finally slipped, revealing regret. “I truly am sorry.”
Leah couldn’t bring herself to tell Tess she was forgiven.
“Do you think, given time, we can continue as we have been?” Tess asked. “You, me, Dylan, and Rudy?”
“I don’t know.” Leah stood. “I honestly don’t know.”
They looked at each other for an agonizing stretch of time.
Then Leah walked from the cabin.
As she drove home, she wished with a yearning that stole her breath that she could go to Sebastian’s house, pour out her story, and find comfort in his arms.
God, her spirit howled, where are you?
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The next morning, Saturday, Leah attempted to sleep off her misery hangover. The thought of Sebastian, Tess, and Rudy being deleted from her life all at the same time?
Unconscionable.
Sadly, life dictated that when you wanted to sleep to avoid reality, you could not. She woke at 6:02 and couldn’t fall back to sleep.
Burrowing under her covers, she tried to escape into Han Solo’s world by watching movies on her laptop.
It didn’t work.
Eventually she talked herself into making breakfast, though she wasn’t hungry. Then she talked herself into showering and dressing to go hiking, though hiking didn’t appeal, either.
Around eleven, she finished blow-drying her hair and padded to Dylan’s bedroom door. “You awake?”
He answered with a grunt.
“Blueberry muffins are on the counter,” she told him. “But if your tastes tend more toward the savory on this fine morning, we also have enough chicken noodle soup to soothe a thousand head colds.”
“I’ll eat the muffins.”
“Okay. Fair warning—we’re out of orange juice.”
As she was crossing the living room, her peripheral vision registered movement through her front window. She glanced toward it just in time to see Sebastian come to a solemn stop on her walkway.
Their eyes met and a crescendo of need, love, caution, joy, and pain exploded inside. Why had he come? To make amends? To say good-bye?
She loved him. However, her elation warred with practicality. Don’t get your hopes up, she told herself. You are a woman of logic and reason. Stay logical. Stay reasonable.
She pulled on a pink athletic jacket, stepped outside, and gestured for Sebastian to follow her. They came to a stop on the patch of driveway in front of the closed mouth of the garage. This position would give them at least partial privacy from Dylan, should he rouse himself from his room.
Sebastian wore a severe black wool coat over an untucked white business shirt and dark jeans. The hue of the coat matched the hue of his hair. His bruise had turned purple.
Behind him, the sky widened, hazy and pewter. The ice-tipped breeze paled his unsmiling face. “Are you all right?” he asked.
Obviously, the observant doctor could tell that she was off her game. “Physically, I’m fine. My bruise was less severe than yours, because it’s almost gone. Emotionally, though, I’m as unhappy as I’ve ever been. I’ve hardly slept the last two nights.”
“Why?”
“The state of our relationship. But also because I discovered the identity of Bonnie O’Reilly.”
“And?”
“She’s my friend Tess. They’re . . . one and the same.”
“What?”
She described how she’d come to realize Bonnie was Tess. “A woman I’ve trusted for years switched me at birth. She took Jonathan Brookside’s baby—me—and gave me to Erica and Todd Montgomery. Which was a terrible thing to do. Yet, she did it for reasons I can somewhat understand. In summation, I don’t know what to think—”
“Leah.” Sebastian nodded toward the corner of the garage.
She swung in the direction he’d indicated and saw Dylan standing there.
Dylan. Had heard her.
Undiluted horror washed through her.
Dylan’s face leached white. His car keys dangled from his hand. “I was going to get orange juice.”
Because he threw his stuff down in the mudroom, he always exited through the back door and walked around the garage to his parking spot on the street. She’d been so fixated on Sebastian that she hadn’t heard him.
“You were switched at birth?” Dylan asked.
No. She didn’t want him to know! Until now, she’d been so careful to shield him.
“Dylan,” she began. Her voice sounded unnatural, rattled. “Let’s go inside and talk about this—”
“Were you switched at birth?” he asked, angry now.
She pursed her lips and sought for an escape route that would enable her to give anything other than a direct answer. “Let’s go inside.”
“I don’t want to go inside!” He gestured sharply. The keys made a jangling sound. “It’s a simple question.”
“Watch it,” Sebastian warned Dylan in a low tone.
“Were . . . you . . . switched . . . at . . . birth?” Dylan asked her, as if she were hard of hearing.
She looked at him pleadingly. “Yes.”
“I’m not your brother?”
“You most definitely are my broth—”
“But I’m not, by blood?”