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My mother looked confused, but I could see patience, her desire to understand.
It almost broke me.
My father—Raphael—he had never, ever done that. Had never seen me and wanted to make me feel better.
I sensed that she did, felt like she really cared.
“He told me the truth. That he isn’t my biological father.”
She blinked. “He told you that?”
“Yeah, he did. Said that you got knocked up, and my grandfather needed you married off.”
She looked at me, her expression one I couldn’t quite read. “That bastard.”
I heard the scorn in her voice, the hatred, and was a little bit taken aback by it.
I shouldn’t have been. After all, Davit had told me at least a little bit of her story.
But to see the change in her, hear how she went from concerned to angry was disconcerting.
“I’m sorry,” she said, seeming to sense my observation. “It’s just…”
It was her turn to trail off, look away, and I studied her, suddenly coming to a realization.
“If you’re thinking of a lying, I wouldn’t,” I said.
After I spoke the words, she looked at me, and that frown was back.
But it didn’t sway me.
“Look, I don’t know what’s going to happen with us. If anything is going to happen at all. But one thing I can promise you is that I will not—I cannot—tolerate lies. I need you to tell me the truth. Always.”
She nodded. “I understand that. And respect it. And I promise you, I will never, ever lie to you. You mean too much to me for that, and I will not jeopardize the chance to get to know you. Especially not in the name of Raphael James.”
“But in this case, lying about my biological father wouldn’t be to protect him. It would be to protect you.”
She shrugged. “I can see why you’d say that, but he’s your father.”
“He says differently,” I said with a shrug.
“I…” She trailed off, seeming to consider words before she looked at me again. “Raphael is your father.”
“Then why would he lie?” I asked.
I knew now that my father had always hated me and figured my paternity was the reason why.
“To make himself feel better. Maybe to make it possible for him to do the things that he did. I don’t know. I never understood him,” she said.
There was a fleeting twinge of pain and regret in her voice.
“Do you wish you had never met him?” I asked.
She looked at me immediately, her face almost severe in its intensity. “Of course not. Don’t ever think such a thing. As much pain as he cost me, as much as he made me suffer, he gave me you. And you’re worth every single second of pain. Holding you in my arms for the first time. Seeing you now… All of that was worth every day of suffering I experienced at his hands.”
“So, my father?” I asked, trying to get us back on topic.
“Is Raphael. I got pregnant about a month before the wedding. Your grandfather did insist we get married sooner, but it had always been our plan to marry.”
