Page 12 of Wedding Season
“Alex, I’m so sorry.” His assistant flicked a hostile glance toward Mariella. “Glenna told me what happened. If I would have been here, I could have stopped her.”
“I’m not some kind of assassin,” Mariella muttered.
“You’re worse,” Heather said, her voice fraught with more emotion than the situation warranted.
“It’s okay.” Alex repeated the words he’d said to Glenna. Damn, he must have really looked like a sad sack in that wedding video—and possibly even now—for his employees to be so overprotective.
“It’s not.” Heather took a step forward, her gaze now fixed on Mariella. “She has no right to be here. The damage she’s done—”
“You don’t even know me,” Mariella argued, moving toward the young assistant. “This is none of your business.”
“Heather, it’s really fine. There was a misunderstanding with Luann and—”
“I know you,” Heather whispered, and something close to panic snaked along Alex’s spine as the girl continued to stare at Mariella with an explained fury.
He didn’t know what was happening at this moment but had a feeling it didn’t have anything to do with designing workout apparel.
Mariella drew in a shaky breath as her eyes widened, abject panic in their depths. “You can’t.”
“I do, and I think you know me, too.” Heather tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and it was then Alex noticed that her blond hair was the same pale honey shade as Mariella’s. In fact, the two women could be related now that he looked more closely. They could be—
“You know me.” Heather’s voice quivered with emotion. “Because you were the woman who put me up for adoption less than twenty-four hours after I was born.”
CHAPTER FOUR
MARIELLAPICKEDUPthe glass of water from the counter of the Wildflower Inn’s kitchen later that night then placed it back down when it was obvious her hand continued to tremble.
After driving nearly an hour out of town, Mariella had turned her car around and come to the inn. She was afraid to go home. Afraid her...the girl with the wounded blue eyes and hair the color of her own would have been waiting for her.
How could she ever truly face the child she’d given up eighteen years ago?
That decision had been the most difficult one she’d ever made but also the easiest. She’d been a naive, ignorant teenager who’d made a huge mistake believing the whispered lies and promises a boy had made to her in the shadows of his dingy bedroom at a late-night party.
At that point, she’d known she wanted to get away from the life she’d grown up in but had no clue how she was going to manage it. She’d had no idea if she would truly make it out. There was a better than average chance she wouldn’t and no way she would risk another girl growing up with those kinds of obstacles.
A friend of her mother’s had told her about the adoption attorney who would make sure her baby had a good life.
Mariella had always assumed her child had grown up with a family who loved her. With vacations to Disney World and summer camps and a mom who baked cookies and kissed boo-boos instead of opening their home to a revolving door of men.
But she didn’t know for sure. Nothing was certain in life, and it felt like the curiosity that stabbed at her as though she were lying on a bed of tacks would never be fully satisfied.
“Tell me again. You really just walked away from her today?” Emma asked from the other side of the island. It was nearly eleven, and the guests who were in town for the weekend’s wedding had all gone up to bed. This kitchen had become a refuge of sorts and Mariella gripped the edge of the granite like that piece of driftwood at the end of theTitanicmovie.
“Well, I made it as far as the lobby, and then I puked into the garbage can next to the receptionist desk. But I kept moving. I picked up that trash receptacle and didn’t slow down. No way was I going to let Alex or...that girl catch up to me.” She sighed. “I’ll have to return the trash can at some point, once I hose it down.”
Emma shuddered. “I’m guessing they won’t want it back.”
“Alex seemed as shocked as I was,” Mariella said softly. “But he had to know about Heather. That was her name. Heather. How else would she have ended up in Magnolia? He hired her. Maybe the whole start with Mary Ellen at the bakery was a ruse.”
“I only met him the two weekends he spent at the inn as the best man in Brett and Holly’s wedding.” Emma tapped an elegant finger to her chin. “He didn’t strike me as cruel. Why would he have done something like that?”
“To punish me. Isn’t it obvious?” She knew the accusation was far-fetched, but she wanted to blame someone. To share the blame for the pain in her daughter’s eyes. “I’m not saying I don’t deserve it.”
“I’m saying you don’t deserve it,” Emma told her. “I don’t believe Alex had anything to do with it. Even if he wanted to hurt you, do you really think he would have brought an innocent girl into it?”
Mariella’s mind and heart were too pulverized to think or feel with any sort of clarity. As far as she was aware, no one from her current life had even known about the baby she’d given up for adoption when she was sixteen.
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Emma asked as if reading her thoughts.
