Tessa winced, but I wasn’t finished.
I opened the next envelope.
This one had been written weeks later.
“Nicole, I’m sorry for putting this at your door. I know what Alex did to you. But if something happens to me, Tessa shouldn’t be left carrying his choices alone.”
My eyes caught on the next sentence.
“She has a sister who doesn’t even know she exists.”
I looked at Tessa.
“You knew about me?”
“Mom showed me a picture. Dad had told her about you.”
“What did she say?”
“That you were my little sister.”
I pushed another letter toward her.
“How did this become Mom taking you in?”
“My mom got worse. Eventually, she asked.”
“And Mom said yes?”
“Not at first.”
Tessa looked down.
“Michelle told her, ‘You don’t owe me anything. But Tessa doesn’t owe Alex for what he did either.'”
I looked at the letters.
That sounded like Mom.
She hadn’t forgiven Dad. She’d simply stopped blaming his child.
“Mom met me before Michelle died,” Tessa said. “I asked if you knew about me.”
“What did she say?”
“No.”
“And?”
Tessa looked down. “I said that was good because I thought you’d hate me.”
I swallowed.
“I did. For things you didn’t do.”
Then I noticed another paper.
Dad’s signature was at the bottom.
I checked the date twice.
“This was two years after he left us.”
Tessa went still.
“What did he sign?”
“Consent connected to the adoption.”
“He was alive. Reachable. And he signed.”
Tessa nodded.
“He knew Mom had you. He knew where she lived.”
I stood so quickly that the chair scraped behind me.
“Then he knew where I was.”
“I think so.”
“Did he ask about me when you saw him?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did he ask to see me?”
Tessa looked down.
“Tessa.”
“No.”
All those birthdays, I’d wondered whether Dad couldn’t find us.
But someone had found him when they needed his signature.
He simply hadn’t come for me.
Behind me, Tessa said quietly, “He was a coward, Belle.”
I turned from the sink.
“And Mom knew he was alive. She knew he’d signed those papers and could’ve contacted us if he’d wanted to.”
Tessa nodded.
