Page 64 of The Lovers
“I felt it was important for Child Services to know your birthday, and I thought of you as Quinn all throughout the latter part of my pregnancy. I thought you were a boy for some reason, and Quinn was a good strong name. I thought it might work for a girl as well. I assumed that your adoptive parents would change your name, but they hadn’t, and seeing it on the screen gave mesuch a turn. I knew who you were as soon as I laid eyes on you, and it nearly broke me.”
“Do you have children?” Quinn asked quietly.
“Yes. I have two sons. I returned home after you were born and, in time, married a local boy. I live in London now.”
Quinn stared at Sylvia. She felt numb. It would take time to fully absorb what she’d just learned, but being an academic, she needed to learn as much as she could.
“Did you ever see Robert Chatham again?” she asked.
“Yes, I saw him several times in the village. He smiled and saidhelloto me as if nothing had happened. If I hadn’t become pregnant, I probably would have begun to doubt that anything had.”
“And the others?”
“I never saw them again. They only came down for the holidays that one time.”
“Do you know their names?” Quinn asked.
“One was called Seth and the other Rhys. Rhys was from Wales.”
“It’s a common enough name,” Quinn said, talking to herself. She was shaken to the core by Sylvia’s story and couldn’t handle one more shock.
“Yes, it is, but that man you were with at the church,” Sylvia said. “I think that was him. He didn’t recognize me. Why should he? I meant nothing to him,” she said bitterly.
Quinn felt as if a bucket of cold water had suddenly been upended over her head. Was it really possible that the man she’d come to like and admire, the man who made romantic advancestoward her, was a rapist? And what’s worse, that rapist could be her biological father.
FORTY-SIX
Quinn remained immobile, staring into the dying fire long after Sylvia left. She scribbled down her mobile number and said that she would remain in the village until lunchtime tomorrow should Quinn wish to talk. Sylvia anticipated that Quinn would have more questions once she’d had ample time to think about what she’d learned. Quinn hugged her knees to her chest and rested her forehead on them, wishing to make herself as small as possible. The tears had dried, but she still felt as fragile as a glass bauble that could shatter into tiny fragments if not handled with the utmost care.
She’d spent over twenty years dreaming of her biological parents, imbuing them with all kinds of wonderful characteristics and inventing tragic love stories fraught with insurmountable obstacles in her desperation to believe that they would have kept her if they could. And now that she knew the truth, she wished that she could go back to her fantasies and never, ever learn the reality of what happened. Her father was a rapist, and her mother admitted freely that she simply didn’t want her, couldn’t love her despite the fact that Quinn had grown in her body for nine months and belonged to her more than to any of the men who’d forced themselves on her. And how was she supposed to work with Rhys Morgan after what she’d learned? The thought of facing him tomorrow was more than she could bear.
Quinn’s first impulse had been to call her parents and tell them what happened, but after nearly dialing the number, she replaced the phone on the sofa next to her. She couldn’t do that to them. They’d be devastated for her and suddenly unsure of theirplace in her world. Well, their place would never change. They were her mum and dad. They’d taken her in, loved her, cherished and protected her, and given her the encouragement and support she needed to be the person she was today. She’d rather die than hurt them. Perhaps they never needed to find out about Sylvia at all. Quinn had no intentions of ever seeing the woman again. What was the point? But she did need to talk to someone, and that someone was Gabe. It was just past ten, and she hoped that he’d be at home.
Gabe picked up on the third ring, his voice gruff. “Hello, Quinn,” he said. Normally, he would have asked about her day and told her about his. Quinn would hear a smile in his voice when he told her of something funny that had happened or recounted some silly joke, but now his voice had a granite edge to it, and he was doing nothing to make things easier for her. It was up to her to do the talking.
“Gabe, something’s happened,” Quinn said quietly, desperate for him to care. There was a momentary silence as Gabe obviously waged an internal battle between his wounded pride and his long-repressed feelings. He hadn’t called her since the night she lashed out at him, and Quinn wondered if their relationship was over once and for all. Would he politely tell her that he no longer wanted her in his life?
“Gabe?” Quinn prompted when he didn’t immediately respond. “Will you not speak to me?” It must have been a close thing, but love won in the end and Gabe replied, unable to reject her.
“Of course, I’ll speak to you. What’s happened?” he asked, his voice softening. “Are you all right, Quinn?”
“No, not really.” Quinn hadn’t even realized how not all right she was until she heard Gabe’s voice. She opened her mouthto speak, but all that came out was a shuddering sob that turned into a full-blown breakdown.
“I… She… My mother,” Quinn said, gasping as she tried to calm down. She hadn’t meant to blub like this and had hoped to discuss the situation with Gabe calmly, but she couldn’t seem to stop sobbing, a wave of devastation sweeping her along and smashing her against the rocks until she felt as if she were mangled beyond repair.
“Quinn, is your mother ill? Talk to me,” Gabe pleaded with her.
“No. Not her.” Quinn took a deep breath and tried again. It took several tries, but she finally got the words out. “Gabe, my birth mother came to see me tonight.”
“What? You’re kidding. Tell me everything.” Thankfully, he’d forgotten all about his own hurt feelings for the moment. He knew what it meant to Quinn to find out about her past. “Wait. I’m coming over.”
“It’s late.”
“I don’t care. I need to see you.”
Quinn rang off and hugged herself. Knowing that Gabe would be there in less than an hour made her feel infinitely stronger and calmer. She’d been such a fool. She’d been so thoughtless, so dismissive of his feelings when he had been the one to love her all this time. He’d always been there for her, even when she was in a relationship with a man he considered unworthy, a man who left her for another woman and didn’t even have enough respect for her to break things off in person. Deep down she knew that Gabe would drop everything to come to her aid—he always had. He was the one man she trusted, the one man she loved. What had she been thinking when she rejected him so cruelly? She’d been mourning her relationship with Luke and coming to termswith the fact that the future she’d envisioned for herself was no longer hers when she should have been thanking her lucky stars that she’d been spared years of misery with a man who clearly didn’t love her.
Quinn sprang to her feet and flung open the door when she heard a car pull up. Gabe slammed the car door and walked toward her. He didn’t say anything, just took her in his arms as she melted into him, thankful that he hadn’t forsaken her.
