Page 39 of Tito
“Yes,Daddy…” Julianna hesitated then said, “She was.”
“And you say this Deacon Walker gave you these birth certificates?” Tommaso asked.
“Yes, he’s our brotherapparently,” Julianna told them in a hard tone. “Not that I knew any of this before.” Her voice rose in anger again as she snapped, “Why?”
The couple stared at her then glanced at each other.
Silence stretched out for a long minute or two.
Finally, Tommaso looked back at us and said, “I am your true father. Just so you know.”
Bianca started to cry.
“How can that be?” Julianna asked doubtfully.
He shrugged and explained, “I met Olivia Walker a couple of years before I met your mother. We were together for about a year. Then she suddenly left me. No note, no reason. I never found her. So I moved on with my life. Thank goodness, I metBianca. But I swear, I didn’t know what Olivia was really like. She had been a lovely person when I was with her…” He shook his head. “Then later, she turned out to be—”
“Insane?” Julianna exclaimed as she cut him off. “Dangerous, a killer…”
I placed my hand over hers to try to calm her down as I gazed at the screen. “I can see why you didn’t know. Olivia raised me. And that whole time, she never showed me what other people told me had been her real self. I never knew the truth about her. I also never knew I had a sister.”
“When you were both about two years old, Olivia brought you to us. I couldn’t have children,” Bianca explained in a sad tone. “We tried and tried. Then a doctor told me that I probably couldn't have any. So that hurt a lot.”
“Imagine our shock when she just arrived at our door with the both of you,” Tommaso added. “I never even knew she’d gotten pregnant and had twins.”
“Why would she do that?” I asked. “Give us to you?”
They shook their heads.
“She said with her life and work, babies didn’t fit into it,” Bianca explained. “We loved you both the very second we saw you. To be honest, I barely cared why. It didn’t matter to me. It was the best day of my life! I loved you like you were my own. You were so adorable and precious. Smart as all get out. I was amazed by you both every day and I got up every morning just to rush to your room. I loved every minute of being your mother. It was an honor and a Godsend to me.”
We all stared at her and could see the light in her eyes, the joy on her face.
Suddenly, tears filled her eyes as she went on, “Then she came back. That was my worst day. I felt like…Like part of me was missing and nothing could ever fill it.” Covering her facewith her hands, she added, “It was a nightmare!” She sobbed into her hands.
Our father went on to explain since his wife was quietly weeping now, “We had legal custody and she had signed away all her rights before. I swear we never knew that she would simply sneak back into our lives and take one of you…I don’t know how she fooled us with the nanny part. Of course, she had different hair… blonde in fact. She had airtight credentials and her background check was flawless. As Nanny Bea, she seemed to be taller, with a different eye color and had glasses. Then she had a southern accent. She had to have worn makeup so we never saw the scars she had before. She acted sweet and she seemed almost shy and the real Oliva wasn’t any of those things. After she took Valentina, I kept going over the fact that we never knew it was Olivia that we had hired as your nanny. I couldn’t forgive myself. I had allowed her to just take you away.” He let out a long breath and shook his head. “I-I mean we never found any proof that it was her, but we figured after a while that it had to have been her. Damn, we just never had any real proof though and even if we did, we could never find her. The cops were the ones to bring that up. About Olivia being the one who took you. I never even thought…I mean how could I not know it was her? We…” He shook his head sadly and stared at me. “...looked for you, for a long time. We protected Julianna like never before. With help from the government, we were able to change our names.” He gave Julianna a nod as he stared at her now. “Yours too, Julie.”
Bianca nodded. “We didn’t have a choice really, but we had always called you Julie anyway. We feared Olivia would come back. We moved to New York City as this all happened upstate in a small town. With the millions living in the City, we hoped our new identities would hide us from her.” She swiped at her tears and stared at me. “We missed you so much, Valen.”
It was my turn to gasp as I asked, “Valen?”
Nodding, Bianca gave us a trembling smile. “It is what we called you.”
I looked over at Tito.
Smiling, he nodded at me.
Tito had been the only one who called me Valen. At least that was what I thought. “But Ophelia… I mean Olivia called me Valencia.”
They shook their heads.
“We don’t know anything about that,” Bianca said.
“It sounds wild,” Tito spoke up. “But maybe she changed your name for the same reason. To hide you?”
I stared at him and said, “Maybe?”
“So, basically, we were your true parents,” Tommaso spoke again.
