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‘I flew up to Scotland early this morning after arranging to meet Sandra’s husband yesterday. She wouldn’t see me but, frankly, after what you’d told me I didn’t think I’d get too far with her anyway. I met Jim for lunch in a hotel down the road from their home; he’s a good man.’ She nodded again without speaking. She vaguely remembered seeing him in the background as she’d stumbled out of the house on her last visit, but his face had been a blur through her tears. ‘Amy, how important is it to you that Sandra is your sister?’
‘What?’ Her head jerked up as she stared into his dark face. ‘Oh, I don’t know.’ She shook her head slowly. ‘Not at all now really, too much has happened.’
‘Well, she isn’t related to you at all.’ His arm tightened still further round her. ‘And this next bit might hurt a little. The couple you looked on as mother and father weren’t your parents.’
‘Blade, I don’t understand any of this.’ She looked at him, her eyes huge.
‘Then let me explain. Apparently about three years after Sandra was born her parents found out about the disease when it began to show symptoms in the mother. They had everything checked and the worst was confirmed. They wanted more children but of course that was impossible, and so they concentrated on Sandra, spoiling her hopelessly and giving her everything she wanted. And then, when Sandra was seven, her mother’s best friend got pregnant on a one-night stand while her husband was working away in the Far East or some such place. Apparently she couldn’t face an abortion but neither could she keep the child, and so—’ he turned and brought her face round to meet his fully ‘—they hatched a plan, an illegal plan.’
‘Me?’ she asked softly.
‘You.’ He nodded slowly. ‘The four of them, Sandra included, went off for an extended holiday in Latin America and you were born there. Neither of the women had said to anyone they were pregnant, and when Sandra’s mother claimed you were a surprise birth there was no reason for anyone to doubt it. Sandra’s mother was thrilled with her new baby, the friend went back home and her husband never knew anything about it, everyone was happy—except Sandra.’ He eyed her carefully. ‘Apparently you were startlingly beautiful even then, and everything Sandra’s mother had always wanted in a little girl. From what Jim told me, Sandra wasn’t just pushed aside and neglected, they actually inflicted a mental cruelty of the worst kind. I should imagine along with the disease is a form of imbalance in the mind. Sandra has it and her mother certainly did.’
‘Oh, Blade.’ She shivered in the warm darkness. ‘How terrible.’
‘Yes.’ His voice was grim now. ‘Man’s inhumanity to man. Jim knows her mind is sick, but he couldn’t believe what she’d said to you. Apparently she told him you were upset at finding her so ill when he asked why you left crying that time. She’s eaten up with hate, Amy, riddled with it, but he’ll stay with her until the end. He’s that type of man.’ He looked at her for a long moment as she sat trying to absorb what he had said. ‘Would you like to see a picture of your mother?’
‘You have one?’ Her face lit up as a sudden thought occurred. ‘Is she—’
‘No, she’s not alive Amy, I’m sorry.’ He reached into his pocket for a dogeared photograph. ‘She died shortly after she’d had you in some sort of accident, which was one of the reasons Sandra’s mother went overboard. From that point she convinced herself she really had given birth to you, you became hers.’ He placed the faded snapshot in her hand gently.
‘It’s me.’ She looked down at the beautiful smiling face as a little shiver snaked down her spine.
‘Uncanny, isn’t it?’ Blade shook her gently as she continued staring at the photograph in dumb shock. ‘You understand what all this means, Amy? The future is ours again to do with what we want. No nightmares, no bad dreams. You can be yourself again.’
‘But I don’t know who I am any more.’ She raised her head to stare into his dark eyes. ‘It’s a strange feeling, Blade.’
‘You’re my wife.’ He kissed her tenderly, the burning passion that he was trying to keep in check flaring through as he felt her response. ‘And you’ll be our children’s mother. But most of all you are what you have become in the last twenty-two years. You have an identity in your own right, sweetheart, compounded of all the things that have made you you. You are brave and strong and incredibly selfless, you’re my beautiful, beautiful Amy and I love you more than life itself.’
