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“Jacob. How do you know this?” Quick tears filled his mother’s eyes, but she blinked them back and clung to her husband’s hand.
Jacob told them the story, detail by detail. The web of lies, the deceit, the double cross of the agency and the birth mother. The mother, he corrected himself. And when he was done, his parents weren’t as shocked as he thought they’d be. Disappointed, yes. But not blown away by Ginger’s illicit choices.
“How did this all come up, son? What made you go digging?”
And now the hard part. But not so hard, either, when he considered Josie’s heroic actions to save Addie’s life. “Her birth mother lives here. She saw Addie with me and recognized her because Ginger had shown her a picture of Addie at age three, when Addie had the liver transplant. Actually, Addie’s biological mother was the living donor for Addie’s transplant.”
“She was?” Now Sheila put a hand to her chest. “But Ginger said—”
“I know. She told us that Addie’s mother was a drug user and that Addie’s liver came from someone on the transplant match list who requested anonymity. That part was true, because Addie’s mother didn’t want to mess up Addie’s life. But she was no drug user. She’d experimented with a few things in college, years before, but Ginger made it seem like she’d deliberately saved Addie from life with an addict.”
“Yes, she did. Why, I wonder?”
“Because it made her feel nobler?” Jacob had spent a lot of time trying to reason this out, too. “Or less guilty for bilking you guys out of that thirty thousand she claimed was for the birth mother? Because the file firmly states that the mother refused any payment for her role in carrying the child, and that all medical costs were paid for by the mother’s insurance and her own funds. When Addie’s mother came to Atlanta to save Addie’s life, Ginger pretended that she and Adam were still together. She claimed Adam was too overcome with worry about Addie to do anything more than send a note. And here it is.” He handed them the forged note. “For some reason the agency had a copy in the file. They faxed it to me.”
“Not Adam’s handwriting,” his mother pointed out.
“And almost three years after he’d left the family.”
“Wait.” His father looked at the note more closely, then swallowed hard. “This note is thanking Josie…” He studied Jacob. “Is Josie Gallagher Addie’s real mother?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, that poor woman.” Sheila grabbed hold of Jacob’s arm. “She’s had her daughter here all this time, under her nose, and couldn’t acknowledge her?”
Jacob hadn’t thought he could feel worse. “Yes.”
“And her mother must know. The resemblance between Cissy and Addie is so clear now. Jacob, what are we going to do? How can we fix this?”
A question he’d been asking himself for hours now. “I don’t know. I’m going to go see her, but I need Addie to stay here overnight. If that’s all right.”
“It’s more than all right, it’s fine, I just…” Sheila wrung her hands, but she didn’t fall apart. If anything, this information seemed to make her stronger. “Jacob, if there’s anything we can do, just let us know.” She frowned, distraught. “I wasn’t overtly aware that Ginger was up to anything during the adoption proceedings, but I sensed it. And yet, I so desperately wanted her happy. She wasn’t like you, son.” She reached out and hugged him as she had the other night. “She was never happy and never satisfied, always wanting more. But I never imagined she’d go so far as to lie about something as important and special as an adoption.”
“Are you going to see Josie tonight?” his father asked.
He had little choice. She’d be busy all day tomorrow and Saturday, the crazy, pumped-up hours of running a beachside restaurant midsummer. “Yes. And I wouldn’t mind a few prayers coming my way.”
His father clapped a hand onto his shoulder, firm and strong. “I think we can manage that.”
“And please, Jacob, please…” His mother grasped his two hands in hers. “Tell her how very sorry we are for all of her pain. My heart truly goes out to her.”
