Chapter 6 - Why There Was Never A Test
Emily had asked for a DNA test once.
Sophie was six months old.
Richard talked her out of it.
The story came back slowly as Emily stood in the kitchen that evening while Sophie slept upstairs.
Noah had stayed.
Richard had left after Emily told him she could not look at him anymore.
Rachel took Sophie to her room.
Now only Noah and Emily remained.
“I had his address,” Emily said.
“Whose?”
“Yours. Or I thought I did.”
She opened another folder from the shoebox.
Inside was an old laboratory request form.
Never completed.
“I called Dad and told him I wanted to find you and do a test.”
“What did he say?”
“That he had already spoken to you.”
Noah’s face tightened.
Emily continued.
“He said you told him if I tried to establish paternity, you would fight me for custody.”
Noah stood so abruptly the kitchen chair scraped backward.
“I never spoke to him about Sophie.”
“I know that now.”
“He told you I threatened custody?”
“Yes.”
Noah turned away, one hand pressed against his mouth.
Richard had found the perfect weapon.
Emily’s fear.
She was young.
Exhausted.
Living with her parents.
Terrified of losing her baby.
So she stopped looking.
“I hated you for years,” she said.
Noah turned back.
“I hated you too.”
Emily almost smiled.
It failed.
“What happened to us?”
Noah looked toward the ceiling, where Sophie slept one floor above them.
“Your father happened.”
“No. We helped him.”
That answer surprised Noah.
Emily wiped her face.
“We trusted other people more than we trusted each other.”
It was true.
Painfully.
Noah sat again.
“Why did Sophie tell me I’m her father?”
Emily looked embarrassed.
“Because she found the letters last month.”
“You told her?”
“Not exactly.”
Emily had finally explained that before Sophie was born, there had been someone she loved named Noah. That Noah might have been her biological father, but there was no certainty.
Sophie had asked questions.
Lots of them.
Emily answered some.
Avoided others.
Then Rachel mentioned Noah was coming to town for his sister’s anniversary party.
Sophie connected the name.
Found the old photograph.
And decided adults had been inefficient long enough.
Noah laughed for the first time all day.
“She arranged this?”
Emily covered her face briefly.
“She asked Rachel to invite you early.”
Noah stared.
“Your nine-year-old daughter ambushed us?”
“Our daughter maybe.”
The words slipped out.
Both froze.
Emily looked down.
“I’m sorry.”
“No.”
Noah’s voice softened.
“Don’t apologize.”
He looked toward the staircase.
“We should know.”
Emily nodded.
“Yes.”
They scheduled a private paternity test the next morning.
No lawyers.
No Richard.
No grand declarations.
Just truth.
But before they left the clinic, Noah received an email from an address he did not recognize.
No subject.
One scanned page attached.
An old handwritten letter.
From Richard.
To someone named Grant Bennett.
Noah read the first line twice.
We need to make sure Noah never finds out about the baby until the timing problem is resolved.
Noah looked at Emily.
“The timing problem?”
Emily went pale.
Because Richard had never mentioned anyone named Grant.
But Noah had.
May you like
Grant Bennett was Noah’s father.
And he had supposedly died before Sophie was born.
