They’ve been married long enough for Jasper to know when to back off.
They make dinner, still not speaking of Mindy, of her absence at their family meal, of their absence at her bedside. It is strange and feels wrong, but something tells her she needs this. Needs the space. She’ll be a much better mother and wife if she takes care of herself, even if she only indulges in a long shower and sex and a good night’s sleep.
She is pleased to see the kitchen is provisioned well enough and sets about making French onion soup. She caramelizes the onions, the fragrant scents of butter and sherry making her mouth water. When the onions are done, she adds the stock and sets it to simmer, then pulls a baguette out of the freezer and puts it in the oven. Shredding the Gruyère, she goes slower than normal, being careful, cautious. Lets the slow scrape of the fragrant cheese against the metal teeth soothe her.
She still has no idea how she is going to explain things. But food and sex are a good buffer. She’ll tell him after dinner. Wine, she should open wine, too. French, one of the burgundies, maybe splurge with a Pomerol?
“So what’s the big secret you need to tell me?” Jasper plops down on one of the kitchen stools, facing her. It brings them to eye level; he is much taller than she is. She stops grating.
“Here, give me that. Go stir the soup.”
She hands over the cheese and shredder, using the moment to school her face. When she turns back, she takes a deep breath.
“Why do you think I have a secret?”
He gives her that lopsided smile she loves so much. “Babe, we’ve been married for a very, very long time. I can tell when you need to tell me something. Spit it out, you’ll feel much better.”
She takes the cheese from him and sets it aside.
“Please don’t hate me for not telling you this sooner.”
“I could never hate you, Lauren. I love you. Now, what’s going on?”
She chews on her lip briefly, then blurts it out. “I adopted Mindy before she was born.”
There are many reactions she expects from him, but cool acceptance isn’t one of them. “Is that why neither you nor Juliet was a match?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me when we met? Do you think it would have made a difference to me?”
“Well, yes, actually, I did. It’s one thing to be with a woman who has a child, but if that woman has chosen to bring the child into her life, and it’s not hers...”
“That is the dumbest logic I think I’ve ever heard.”
“You are taking this very well.”
“No, I’m really not. Inside I’m screaming at you.” Jasper scrubs his hand across his face, his stubble rasping. “That girl is my greatest gift. I knew it from the moment I met you and met her. It makes no difference to me who birthed her. Though I am hurt—hurt as hell—that you didn’t trust me enough to tell me.”
“I am so sorry.”
“So am I. You’ve broken the trust between us. Just when we need it the most.”
He sounds so sad, it makes her want to weep. He is trying to look into her eyes as if seeing into her soul will help him understand, but she averts her gaze. It hurts too much, seeing the pain she’s caused. She is a coward. Such a coward.
“I never meant to hurt you. I never meant to hold this back. It was personal. It was a decision I made when I might not have been entirely in my best mind, and once I made it, I couldn’t—wouldn’t—walk away.”
“Tell me.”
So she does. Tells him the whole story, from beginning to end, from Kyle’s hateful indifference and the pregnancies and the miscarriage to the doctor, as dispassionately as she can.
When she finishes, he sighs. “We’ll deal with my hurt feelings soon, but for right now, I agree with Juliet. We have to find Mindy’s real mother.”
“I am her real mother.” The words rip out of her in a snarl, and Jasper holds up a hand.
“Biological, babe. That’s all I meant. You’re not in a position to attack me, you know. I’m behaving very rationally for a man who’s just found out his wife’s been lying to him for seventeen years.”
“You are, and I’m sorry.” The timer dings, the bread is done. “Let’s eat. Then—”
“Then we will look for this woman, whether you like it or not.” She starts to interrupt, but he shakes his head. “Lauren, you don’t have a choice anymore. This is bigger than you, your feelings, your pride. We must do whatever it takes to save Mindy’s life.”
“You can’t tell her. You can never tell her.”
He shakes his head again. “The time for secrets is over. We are going to tell her. She loves you. No one could ever take your place.”
“Are you thinking clearly, Jasper? Because I don’t think you are. If we tell Mindy I adopted her, we’ll also have to tell her you’re not her real father. Are you ready for that? We’ve always promised not to share that with her, and now you want to drop the biggest bombshell of her life on top of a potentially fatal disease. She’s seventeen, for heaven’s sake. Even though you think she’s Supergirl, she’s just a seventeen-year-old child who is sick, and might die.”
Genuine pain crosses his face as if her words have been attached to an anvil smashing into his stomach. “Honey, listen to me. This couldn’t have happened in a worse way, I’ll grant you that, but Mindy isn’t stupid. I think she already suspects. She asked me for a book on DNA. She said it was because she was thinking about following Juliet’s steps into the CBI, but I think she wants to understand what her charts are saying. Maybe she senses this, maybe she’s always wondered. Who knows? But she has the right to know her true heritage. And she has the right to the hope that we can find her a match. It’s our duty now. We must put our personal stakes aside and do what’s right by our daughter.”
“You’ve changed your tune. You always said—”
“Circumstances have changed, Lauren. I can’t save my daughter’s life with my blood, and now I know why you can’t, either. So yes, I’ve changed my tune. She’s old enough to know the truth. And we are going to tell her.”
Lauren serves their meal stiffly, silently furious. She can’t let Mindy know. She just can’t. She will do anything she has to, anything, to keep the truth from her.
24
Lauren finds sleep impossible. The bed is too comfortable, the room too dark and quiet. Jasper’s gentle snores and the roaring wind in the trees outside feel like a jackhammer to her brain.
She gets up slowly so as not to wake her sainted husband, wraps herself in his discarded sweater, and steals to her office on the first floor. It is chilly but she welcomes the discomfort, it helps her relax a bit.
He took it so well, the news she wasn’t Mindy’s biological mother. Outside of his desire to tell Mindy the whole truth, he’s handled the revelation better than expected. Oh, she could tell he was furious, ready to burst into screams, but he’d kept himself under control. They sniped at each other the rest of the evening until she locked herself in the bath and he stomped off to clear the snow from the decks. But that was to be expected.
The problem is Jasper’s planned next steps. He doesn’t understand her reluctance to share the news with Mindy. She has to make him see the light.
Lauren will not—cannot—run the risk of losing her daughter to a technicality.
She peels the bandage away from her arm. The cut is ragged, nonuniform. It bisects the other scars, long faded, scars few people outside the family know are there. Everyone who’s ever seen them has been told they occurred in a car accident when she was young. Arm through the glass windshield. Tons of tiny little cuts. The scars so pale now that no one but Lauren can see them.