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“It’s possible. Why else would she have them?” Zoey grabbed one absently and flipped it open. “Used. Ten cents—probably a yard sale. Or secondhand store. Maybe she did like to read.”
“Thrillers and true crime, it looks like. Do you think we should toss them or donate?” Pen asked.
Apparently, it was becoming a matter of cleaning out what Denise had left behind. Well, maybe that was appropriate. It would have to be done eventually. None of them should be stuck doing it alone.
Part of what Denise had left behind that truly mattered were with her right now, while the rest were off somewhere doing Luc-, Caine-, Rafe-, and Simon-type things. She and her sisters were going to clean out the remnants of what their mother had done and begin again. Together.
This was Zoey’s quest now. She’d made a promise to herself the day she’d nearly died in a concert hall floor. “There have to be legal documents around somewhere. Or photo albums. A family Bible. Anything.”
“I think I found a box of Simon’s toys. Do you think he’ll want them?” Pen handed the box to Paige. “Maybe for Mikey or the girls?”
“Possibly.” Paige was quiet for a moment as she dug through the box. “He doesn’t talk about his first eleven years. She didn’t even have his right age listed anywhere. We found that out later. Maybe. We just don’t know. When we were trying to make the guardianship legal. Carrie still hasn’t found his legal long-form birth certificate. What we’ve found were fake. Simon’s, mine, and Luc’s.”
“She messed with a lot of things. I wonder what it was she was hiding from?” Zoey shifted yet another box. “How and why she did it.”
It felt so clinical. This was the woman who had brought them all into the world. Yet, Zoey almost felt like she was at a rummage sale right now. There was no sense of connection at all. “Paranoia, maybe? Delusions? We know at the last she used drugs and alcohol. Maybe she just saw things that weren’t there. At one time, she was probably an intelligent woman, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t delusional.”
Ariella’s father and the twins’ uncle had known the most about Denise. But even what they’d had was minimal. Intelligent, charming, eloquent, and somehow broken at times. That had been about all they had been able to tell her. Denise had made a point of remaining a mystery to everyone who’d known her.
“She didn’t just come out of nowhere, right?” Ariella asked. She’d been quiet as she’d knelt to pick up the old puzzle she’d spilled everywhere. “Maybe she had siblings of her own? A mother and father certainly.”
Ariella dropped one hand to her stomach absently as she stood. Caressed it, just a tiny bit. Zoey’s gaze narrowed as she studied her sister’s scrawny frame.
Ariella was extremely thin, just like Pen. But that shirt was baggy, and Ariella had just turned… Zoey hadn’t noticed before, but…yes… “Ariella, is there something you haven’t told us about yet?”
“What?” Her sister looked down at Zoey’s nod. Her cheeks reddened, and a sweet smile crossed her face. One of hope and love and happiness. “Oh! We’re going to tell everyone at dinner tonight. If Marc lasts that long. He’s acting like he’s done something no one ever has before. His biggest accomplishment yet, I think.”
Zoey snorted at that—Ariella’s husband was the governor of Texas, after all. He’d had plenty ofaccomplishments,but none were as wonderful as his two children Katie and Isaac. And apparently, number three.
Zoey greatly respected the governor of Texas. A bit of a steamroller when he wanted something, but that man adored her sister. And he was dependable—if you needed him, Marc would be there. No matter what mountain he had to move. He was a man you could count on.
“You’re pregnant?” Paige hugged Ariella quickly. Then it was Zoey’s turn.
“Fifteen weeks. We waited until after the first trimester to say anything.”
“That’s awesome.” Pen hugged her next, practically strangling her. “What do Katie and Isaac think?”
“We haven’t told them yet. Marc got a little panicky whenever we’d talk about it before, considering what happened to his first wife. But this one just sort of happened. We’re telling the kids tonight.”
After everyone hugged Ariella and asked for details, they seriously got to work. The quest had to continue. There were answers about who Denise was. Somewhere.
This was the most logical place to look. “Let’s get down to business. If you were going to have a family history, where would you put it?”
She looked at Paige, who’d had even less of a family history than Zoey. Zoey had some photos and mementos kept by a few foster homes she’d managed to hold onto through the years. Paige had none of that. “Where are you putting all the photo albums and birth records and immunization cards and all of that? I kept Pen’s in a small safe. But you two have more kids than I did.”
Zoey had had a small cardboard box with all of Pen’s legal documents until she’d been able to afford a fireproof safe to keep them in. She seriously doubted Denise had had the foresight or the care to keep important documents protected. At least not Simon’s. But it wasn’tSimon’sthey were really looking to find. It was Denise’s. They’d even tried DNA sites and ancestry sites and had found very little to go on.
Not even a distant cousin had popped up on those sites yet. But Zoey’s lackeys at Blessed Reunions were still digging. Even the most paranoid person had some sort of ties to where they came from—even if it was hidden.
There were a few plastic totes in the back of the stacks. They had something written in permanent marker on the front. The plastic was battered. They were old. She seriously doubted Luc’s lackeys had labeled them like that. They’d mattered—to Denise. She looked at Paige. “Help me get those out?”
“That’s what I was thinking.”
“I’ll take one, you take the other.” It involved them and Pen shifting an old recliner that smelled heavily of cigarette smoke out of the way, and Zoey climbing over another before they could reach the purple bins.
She hefted the first bin and slipped it onto the dated kitchen table that had two chairs with it. They’d cleaned off that table and made Ariella take a quick break in one of those chairs. The seats were taped together with silver duct tape that was cracked and peeled. Everything Denise had owned was old and worn and…sad.
How had a human life been reduced to that?
