“What?” Alex said. “Haven’t they even named her yet?”
The baby whimpered, and he turned back to her.
“Hey, little one,” he cooed. I held my breath. He stroked the back of her hand with his thumb. “What shall we call you? Kiara? Do you like that name? You do, don’t you?”
When I closed my eyes, rectangles of light from the tall windows glowed inside my eyelids. It took all my effort to force my eyes open again, to make myself watch.
The midwife undid the snaps and peeled back sticky tabs. She tutted, and murmured to Alex, and they bent their heads closer over the basket.
“What time was she born?” the midwife asked, not bothering to look at me. “When was she last fed?”
“Where’s Dominic?” Alex asked me.
“She’s cold,” the midwife said.
“Does Dominic even know she’s been born?” Alex asked.
“We need to get her warmed up and fed,” the midwife said.
Alex gently extracted his finger from the baby’s grasp, and as the midwife began to poke the tiny limbs into different clothes, he turned to me with a frown of concern. I peered around him as he approached. The woman was flipping back the straps of the car seat and sliding her hands into the bassinet.
“You look terrible, Laura. I’m so sorry you got caught up in all of this.”
He stepped in between me and the car seat, blocking my view.
“Laura, listen. I’m going to take her with me. To make sure she’s safe. Okay? Tell Ruth, tell Dominic—to ring me. We can discuss where we go from here.”
The high-pitched whine of the telephone handset leaked into the room, drilling through my ears and filling my skull with its screech.
“Are you listening? I can’t leave her here. D’you understand?”
The midwife swung the car seat sideways as she moved toward the door, hiding the baby’s face from me. Alex gave my hand a brief squeeze, frowning.
“This is not your fault, Laura. Okay? Get them to ring me.”
The noise in my head swelled and pulsed. Loud, desperate, relentless. It took me an age to reach the window by the front door. They were gone. Alex and the midwife and my baby daughter were gone.
31
Seraphine
IAM SERAPHINE.
IamSeraphine. I am Ruth’s daughter. I am the baby who went with my mother to the cliffs. My real father thought he’d taken me—rescued me—but he hadn’t. I stayed here at Summerbourne, with a man who wasn’t my real father.
I stayed here at Summerbourne and grew up with people whispering behind my back, neighbors scrutinizing my looks, friends asking me why I was so different to my brothers, children teasing me that I came from somewhere else.
I stayed here at Summerbourne where I belonged.
Laura looks at her lap while she talks. Edwin, perched next to her, is poised as if expecting her to topple out of her chair at any moment. The three of us on our sofa—Danny, me, and Joel—alternate between gazing at Laura and staring at Alex and Kiara opposite. My relief at being Seraphine—the real, original Seraphine—rushes through my arteries, while a properunderstanding of what this means for those I love lags behind, like a poison I am trying not to absorb.
Alex is shaking his head, his breathing rapid, and by the time Laura finishes speaking, his face is contorted. He bends forward in his seat as if gripped by pain.
“No,” he says hoarsely. “No.”
Kiara sits straight-backed, her hands curled into fists, her eyes fixed on Laura.
“So you’re my mother?” she says eventually.
