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“I knew about the affairs,” my mom says quietly. She clears her throat as her gaze lifts to mine. “He never mentioned other children.”

My first thought when that girl introduced herself as my sister was denial. Disbelief. There’s no way my father had a second family.

Then anger hit.

And now…now I feel like I’m just not all that surprised given what I knew about him.

I reach across the table to squeeze her hand. I’m trying to be there for my mother as I process the news myself. “So he was just…living another life? Or what?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know, to be honest. There’s Stephanie, so he kept at least one big secret from me. Who does that? Who just keeps secrets of this magnitude from everyone around them?”

Her eyes lift to mine as we both ponder those words. We’re holding onto secrets of our own—ones my dad forced us to make in the first place.

“Well…it tracks, right?” I murmur.

Her brows knit together. “Yes, I suppose it does. He always put the image of the perfect family first. He had the act down pat, this act like he was this God-fearing man who upheld family values.” She shakes her head, but she doesn’t let any tears fall. “Couldn’t have been further from the truth.”

“How are you feeling about all this?” I ask. I lost a father, and she lost a husband…but I don’t feel the real sense of that loss, and I suspect she doesn’t, either. I lost him the second he put me in the back of that car. I wrote off our relationship way back then, and I’m home right now for my mother. Not for him.

I wasn’t close to him, and by all accounts, even though she was married to him and lived in the same house as him…neither was she.

She lifts a shoulder. “I feel like I need to go through the motions and say all the right things and be the strong one.”

My eyes soften as I shake my head. “Not for me, Mama,” I say quietly. “You can break down if you want. Lord knows I’ve done it enough times, and you’ve always been there to catch me.”

She shakes her head. “What he did to you, to us…to our family.” She lowers her voice to a whisper. “I never forgave him, and even in death, I don’t know if I can.”

I press my lips together as I try to keep it together. She doesn’t have to be strong for me, but maybe I can be strong for her. “I never did, either. I don’t think I’m strong enough to do it.”

We both stare at our hands where they’re joined, both of us feeling shame and guilt over our confessions. The church we’ve spent so much of our lives at teaches us to forgive…yet neither of us can find it within ourselves to actually extend that forgiveness.

“You know what he used to say to me?” she asks, and our eyes lock as I shake my head. “He used to say that if the families of murder victims could grant forgiveness, surely I could give him mine.”

I catch my bottom lip between my teeth. “Did he really?”

She nods.

Our situation was different. There were no murders, but there was a family torn apart. There was a relationship cut short that never should have been. There was a ripple effect because of his actions. He made decisions that weren’t his to make, and he left the rest of us to deal with the consequences.

And, according to the woman two years younger than me who just left my mother’s house…we weren’t the only ones he did that to.

“He doesn’t deserve it, Mama.”

“Everyone deserves forgiveness. Don’t you think?”

I sigh. “We’re riding a line here I’m not sure I want to get into given my upbringing, but I firmly believe if someone repents for what they did, then they deserve forgiveness. He never did that. No repentance. No apologies. No remorse. Instead, he stood on firm ground that he made the right choice for me. For us…for all of us.”

I always thought he’d just been a royal asshole to me because I was dumb enough to get pregnant. I didn’t realize he was a royal asshole to everybody.

Add the way Cam treated me after he bent me over his desk on top of that, and I’m not sure how I move forward without trust issues. I’m not sure how I overcome betrayal after betrayal. I’m not sure how I escape this week without deep emotional wounds, and furthermore…I’m not sure how I heal those wounds.

Random sex with a colleague doesn’t really seem like the way to solve that issue, but like he told me, it’s never going to happen again anyway.

“I can’t argue with that,” she says softly, and then she stands and moves toward the sink. The dishes are done. Stephanie declined my mother’s invitation to stay for dinner. She wanted to introduce herself before the funeral. According to her, my father visited her twice a month and sent her and her mother money. He put her through college.

She had proof.

Photos with him—with her and her mother, too. Family pictures, like he was living another life with them then returned home to his real family.

How did I not know? How did my mother not know?

It doesn’t make any sense.

This Stephanie girl—she was nice enough given this very strange situation, but something felt…off. I don’t think she really has any reason to lie about the fact that we’re half-sisters, but showing up out of the blue right after his death feels strange, like she was waiting for him to die before she revealed herself.

And that makes me wonder what he did to her. How he kept her quiet until he wasn’t around to keep her quiet any longer.

How she feels given the fact that she was his second family. Does she fear rejection since he chose us? Or did he choose us by default because he’d married my mother?

Did he even want to be with us?

And I have other questions, too.

How many more Stephanies are out there? How many more half-siblings do I have?

Will I find out over the next few days, or is this something I’ll never have the answer to?

My phone dings with a notification, and I glance absently at the screen.

New text message.

I open the notification from a number I don’t recognize, my heart racing as I wonder if it’s another sibling.

Unknown Number: My condolences, Nurse. You are in my thoughts.

The Nurse jab is a pretty big clue as to who it’s from since there’s only one person on God’s green Earth who calls me that, and after the way we left things, I’m frankly shocked he texted me and even more shocked he just admitted he’s thinking about me.

I don’t know what to say as my heartrate picks up speed.

I must stare at the message for a long time because eventually my mother breaks into my thoughts. “Everything okay?”

I sigh as I glance up at her. “Yeah.”

She slides into the chair across from me. “That heavy sigh tells me it’s not. What’s going on?”

I shrug. “It’s just…there’s this new doctor at our practice and he’s such a jerk, but then the other day we kissed and then…” I trail off. I’m not about to admit to my mother that he fucked me from behind over his desk yesterday just moments before she called me to tell me about my father.

“And then?” she asks.

“He basically told me nobody could ever find out,” I finish weakly. “But he just texted me sending his condolences and he said he’s thinking about me. I didn’t even know he had my number, and I never expected him to admit he’s actually thinking about me.”

She raises her brows. “Do you think this could turn into something?”

I lift both shoulders as I shake my head and avert my gaze to my phone. “I think we’re just from two different worlds. He thinks he’s superior to me because he’s a little older and paid more for his degree.”

She chuckles. “Or maybe he’s the boy pulling your pigtails because he likes you. Ever think of that?”

My gut tells me that isn’t what this is, but maybe she’s right.

“What are you going to say to him?” she asks.

“I don’t know,” I murmur, my eyes back on his message.

I type a response.

Thank you.

It doesn’t seem like enough.

Thank you. I’m thinking of you too.

That seems like too much.

I try one last time.

Thanks, Cam. I appreciate it.

I click send before I can stop myself.

A reply comes at lightning speed.

Cam: It’s Dr. Foster. [wink emoji] Are you holding up okay?

I let out a small giggle despite the thoughts I just had about him and how hurt and betrayed I feel over how he treated me. Maybe he was just embarrassed that we did it at the office. There has to be some explanation.

“What?” my mom asks.

“I called him by his first name and look at his reply.” I slide my phone over to her.

She reads the text, and her brows shoot up as she smiles at me. “See, honey? He likes you.”

I can’t help when my cheeks heat at the thought of it. “I like him, too. I think. Sometimes I think I hate him, though.”

She giggles. “All the more fun for a fiery, passionate romance.”

“Mama!” I scold, and she just laughs again.

“Despite the reason, it’s nice having you home,” she says, squeezing my arm.

“It’s nice being here, too.”

Neither my mother nor I mention the fact that my dad isn’t here, or that Tristan isn’t here…but it’s something unspoken hanging in the air inside the kitchen. I finally reply to the doctor.

Me: I’m okay. Thanks for checking.

“Have you spoken with Sue lately?” I ask, wondering if my mom has any intel on Tristan from his mother.

She presses her lips together and shakes her head. “We aren’t as close as we used to be.”

“Oh, Mama. What happened?” They were inseparable, but then I was forced to move away and my dad didn’t want the truth getting out. I’m sure having to lie to her best friend didn’t help matters.

“Honestly? I suspect your father did something to upset the balance. I don’t know if he came onto her or what, but a year or so ago, something shifted between us.”

“How come you didn’t tell me?” I ask.

She sighs. “I kept thinking she was just busy jetting back and forth to Vegas, but it seems like more than that. Besides, I didn’t want to bother you with the reminders of your past.”

I press my lips together. In a strange way, I think I can understand that…but at the same time, it’s not a reminder when my mind is continually tormented by what happened.

“I’m here now, Mama,” I say softly. “It’s just you and me. No more secrets between us, okay?”

She closes her eyes and nods, and I have a feeling that I’m going to learn a lot over the next week.