“That’s what I tried to say when you interrupted me. He didn’t ask me to come back for him, but for Dorothea.”
“Wow, this keeps getting better. He asked you that three months ago, and you just got around to it now? If Dora had you to count on, she would have been lost somewhere in the system by the time you deemed it convenient to come for her.”
“I knew she was safe with you.”
“So there was no rush, huh? And there will never be one, so you can return to wherever you’ve disappeared for the past four years, and just never come back again.”
“I can’t and won’t do that.”
“Don’t posture. It was just something Petros said.”
“It was something he wrote. In his will.”
That felt like a resounding slap across her face.
A minute passed before she stammered, “I—I can’t believe Petros wrote such a will. If he did, he must have been panicking after the accident, when he suspected from everyone’s evasions that Nadine was dead, and realized he’d die, too.” Naomi shook her head. “And it still doesn’t make sense he’d think you’d make Dora a better guardian than me.”
“He didn’t ask for me to be her guardian. He wanted me to give her my name.”
She gaped at him. He looked deadly serious. And she found herself staggering back and collapsing on the armchair he’d just vacated.
Then denial surged, pitching her forward. “This is preposterous. I know Petros loved me, but he loved you way more—God only knows why, or how he could love you at all. But how could he think that Dora would be better off with you rather than with me, who’s been her other mother all along? How could he believe you’d make a better parent for her? I could have understood it if he wanted you to be her guardian, financially, though he also knew I’d need no help in that area.”
She gulped down the agitation that threatened to suffocate her. “Though he never cared about money beyond being comfortable, maybe it was different when it came to his daughter. Maybe he wanted you to secure her future beyond anything I could afford. But to ask you to be her father? You of all people? Who never nurtured a living thing, not even a pet or a plant? You, who hates children?”
“I don’t hate children. I never said I did. I said I would never have any. If it had been my choice, I wouldn’t have. But this is no longer a matter of choice. Petros was specific in his will in what he needed me to be to Dorothea. And I will fulfill the terms of his will to the letter.”
“And I say again, don’t bother. I will have his will overturned. He was on death’s door and not of sound mind when he had it written.”
“He drew up his will seven months before the accident. As soon as Dorothea was born, in fact.”
Naomi slumped back, the world collapsing around her like a burning building. “I don’t believe you! If there is such a will at all, his attorney should have informed me of it, should have let me know of your alleged claim, since it directly clashes with mine.”
“Petros used my attorney to draw up the will, and had it delivered directly to me. He told me not to inform you of it until it was possible for me to come do it in person.”
Andreas approached her as he spoke, and she felt as if she was waiting for a tidal wave to crash on top of her and crush her.
Once in front of her, he bent smoothly. She lurched backward, unable to bear his physical closeness now, feeling she’d lose all control if he touched her.
He didn’t. He just reached for the briefcase at her feet. Straightening, he opened it, produced a file. Bending once more, he placed it, opened, on her lap.
She tore her gaze from his, dragged it to what felt like a slab of ice on her legs, freezing every spark of warmth and life. Her vision blurred on the lines, as if to escape registering the evidence of his claims.
Then her focus sharpened, and every word she read struck her to her marrow with horror.
It was true. Every word he’d said. Apart from the framework of legalese, this was a letter from Petros, in his inimitable voice. Dated two days after Dora’s birth. Signed unequivocally by him.
Suddenly, she felt she’d been stabbed through the heart. That Petros would bypass her in favor of Andreas, giving him Dora...Dora...her baby.
She closed the file with a trembling hand, shoved it to the table as if it burned her, and looked up at him, red-hot needles prickling at the back of her eyes.
Andreas was watching her intently, analyzing her reaction, documenting its every nuance. Didn’t he already know how hard this blow would hit her?
He finally exhaled. “You’re welcome to verify the will’s authenticity.”
“You mean if you wanted to fake a document, I’d have a prayer of proving it was a forgery?”
His head tilted, as if he was accepting praise. “I know for a fact no one would.”
“Spoken like an expert counterfeiter. Forge anything major lately?”
“Not lately, no.”
How blasé he was as he admitted to past and no doubt frequent fraud. But then, why not, when he was certain there was no possibility of exposure?
“But there’s no forgery this time,” he said. “This is authentic.”
She gritted her teeth. “Why should I believe you?”
“What reason do I have for doing this, if it wasn’t?”
“How should I know? No one in this world has any idea what goes on inside your mind, what drives you. For all I know you might be doing this to spite me.”
“Contrary to what you seem to believe, I never wished to spite you. If anything, I only ever wished to do the opposite. I have clearly failed.”
“Gee, I wonder why? Just how did Petros not only love and trust you, but will his daughter to you?”
“So you believe this is his will.”
“I’d give anything for it not to be, but yes, I believe it.” She dropped her head in her hands, feeling it would snap off her neck if she didn’t. “The only reason I can think why Petros might have done this is that he thought it a precaution that would never come into play. He was your age, had every reason to think he’d live another fifty years.”
“Actually, Petros discovered he had an inoperable heart condition two years after he married Nadine.”
Naomi jerked her head up. “What?”
“Once he was diagnosed, he believed his father and grandfather had it, and it was why they died at around forty. Fearing the condition ran in his father’s family, afflicting males only, when he and Nadine decided to resort to IVF through surrogacy, they ensured the gender of the baby to avoid the possibility of passing on the problem. He actually didn’t want to have a child at all after he discovered his condition, hating to think he’d die and leave Nadine and his baby prematurely. But she wanted one so much, he had to do everything in his power to give her one. You know how impossible it was not to give Nadine what she wanted.”
“But...but he never told her of his condition. If he did, she might have never persisted in having a baby.”
“He did tell her. She just didn’t tell you. She insisted that his condition might never threaten his life, and she wasn’t letting it stop them from living their shared life to the fullest. She turned out to be right. It wasn’t his condition that ended up killing him, but a drunk driver.”
Naomi found herself on her feet again, mortification at being left in the dark tightening her every muscle until she felt they’d snap. “I can’t believe she kept this from me!”
Andreas