Behind Every Lie(51)

“I’ll call you as soon as I get back to Seattle,” I promised. “I’ll tell the police everything I’ve learned. They’ll protect me. I’m sure they’ll be in touch.”

“Don’t forget Charlotte,” he murmured as I left, his eyes already drooping shut.

I looked at him blankly.

“Charlotte. Your sister. Half sister. She’ll be across the street at the café with Eloise. She grew up in your shadow, so, yes, maybe she hates you a little right now. But you’re family.”

Outside, the cold wind bit at my fingers. A heavy drizzle quickly saturated my coat. People had started to put up umbrellas, the rain splattering against building windows and plummeting to the ground. It slapped into my hair, cold but oddly refreshing.

My mom had loved the rain. “Rain washes the world clean, Eva,” she always said. “It makes everything fresh and new again.”

I was quickly getting soaked and didn’t have an umbrella, so I jogged across the street and pushed open the door to the Tea and Sympathy café.

I could use lunch about now anyway.

Steamy air smacked me in the face, the competing aromas of coffee and fresh baked goods greeting me. The décor was somewhere between douchey hipster and slick Manhattan—exposed brickwork, pale hardwood floors, reclaimed wood tables.

Charlotte was hunched at the back of the café, her back to me. She was trying to get Eloise to eat a spoonful of something green.

I ordered a sandwich and a pot of tea and plopped my tray on the table next to her. She glared at me, baby spoon hovering in the air. Eloise smacked it, spraying sludgy green food all over Charlotte’s face. She gasped and froze. I expected her to be mad, but instead her eyes softened and she laughed.

“You cheeky little monkey.” She grabbed a napkin and wiped her face, then unbuckled Eloise from her stroller and wiped her clean too.

She was so young. Far too young to be responsible for both her child and her parent. I scanned her face, devoid of a scrap of makeup, blue smudges underneath her eyes. She must’ve caught the pity on my face because her smile dropped, her jaw jutting out defensively. “I know what you’re thinking. Silly cow should’ve remembered her birth control.”

“What? No!” I was shocked by her acerbity.

“Eloise is the best choice I ever made. And believe me, there have been days when it’s been hard. Especially now that Dad’s sick.”

She jiggled Eloise on her knee. Eloise held her fingers and laughed, a sound that squeezed my heart.

“You’re right, I was judging you,” I admitted. “I’m sorry. We all make the choices we can live with, and you’ve clearly made a good one. Eloise is beautiful.”

She turned away and took a sip of her coffee. “Listen, Eva, or Laura, or—I don’t know what to call you.”

“I’m …” I stared at her, unsure what to say. Was I Laura now?

“Whatever. You can go home. I don’t want you here. My mum will be here to collect me in a minute anyhow.”

Hurt cracked through me. I doctored my tea with sugar and milk, trying not to be so sensitive. This girl was my sister. All of this was new for her too. I folded my hands together and leaned forward.

“Tell me about her.”

“My mum?”

“Yes.”

“She’s lovely. She’s an academic. She teaches art history at Oxford.”

“She doesn’t live here?”

Charlotte shook her head. “No. She and Dad divorced when I was two. I think what he said is true—he never got over your mum, and my mum didn’t want to be second-best. After they divorced, she took a job at Oxford and I stayed with Dad.”

Seeing the look on my face, she rolled her eyes. “People don’t give men enough credit. Dads can be amazing too.”

I laughed. “Yeah, sorry. That was a little sexist of me.”

She laughed drily. “I know I chose to have Eloise and stay home with her, but some women don’t want or can’t have that. Mum has a fantastic career and I’m really proud of her.”

“She sounds really great.”

“The best.” Charlotte agreed. “It must be crazy, right? Finding out you aren’t who you thought you were your whole life?”

“I’m not sure I’ve wrapped my head around it, to be honest.”

Eloise bashed both hands against the table, rattling the saucers and mugs. Intrigued by the vibrations, she reached for my mug. I moved it out of her reach, sloshing tea onto my jeans. Eloise laughed, holding a hand out to me. Charlotte sighed and stood up.

“I’ll grab you a few napkins,” Charlotte said. She thrust Eloise at me and hurried to the front of the café.

I held Eloise like I would a football, cautiously, with my fingertips, afraid to drop her. I stared into her wide blue eyes, thinking of the massive, breath-stealing pain I’d carried under my heart ever since giving up my own child.

In the end, I’d decided on adoption. I knew I couldn’t keep my baby, because how could you be a good mother to a child you didn’t even want? A child you hated and blamed, whose every glance would remind you of what you wanted to forget?

Even now, I could picture Mom in the hospital room with me, the baby nestled in her arms. “Hold her just for a minute, Eva.”