“Then who is he?”
He took a breath.
“His name is Noah.”
“I know his first name now. Congratulations.”
“Please don’t do this.”
“Do what?”
“Turn this into something it isn’t.”
I stared at him.
“You own a property I didn’t know existed. There is a woman living there with a child who ran into your arms. You’ve secretly moved thirty thousand dollars out of our savings, borrowed forty thousand from your mother, and lied to both of us about why.”
Daniel looked at the floor.
“So tell me what it is.”
He said nothing.
I waited.
Finally, he whispered, “Noah is my brother’s son.”
I blinked.
Daniel didn’t have a brother.
At least, not one I had ever heard about.
“What?”
He looked up.
“My half brother.”
I stared.
“You don’t have a half brother.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Since when?”
His laugh was bitter.
“Since before I was born.”
The staircase creaked behind us.
Eleanor stood halfway down.
Her face was white.
“Daniel.”
He looked at her.
“I’m done.”
Her grip tightened around the banister.
“Don’t.”
Rachel, she almost said.
But no.
This wasn’t about me.
Daniel stood.
“Mom, she already found the house.”
Eleanor closed her eyes.
I looked between them.
“What house?”
Neither answered.
“What are you talking about?”
Daniel picked up the blue folder.
Then, after a moment, handed it to me.
Inside were copies of mortgage documents.
Bank statements.
A birth certificate.
And a stack of letters held together with a black binder clip.
The birth certificate was for a man named Thomas Reed.
Born in 1978.
Father listed as Charles Reed.
Daniel’s father.
Mother listed as Margaret Ellis.
Not Eleanor.
I looked up.
Eleanor had reached the bottom of the stairs.
“Your husband had another son?” I asked.
Her eyes filled with something I had never seen before.
Shame.
“Yes.”
Daniel sat down again.
