I’d assumed she blamed me for my father’s death. He’d worked himself into a heart attack building the company, and I’d been too young, too inexperienced to take over smoothly.
“Should I send her away?” Marcus asked.
I looked at Sophie, sleeping peacefully.
“No,” I said finally. “Let her come.”
Evelyn was waiting on the porch.
She was in her seventies now, silver-haired and elegant, wearing a simple blue dress.
When she saw me, her face softened.
“Amelia,” she said. “Look at you.”
I stopped a few feet away, suddenly uncertain.
“Aunt Evelyn. I didn’t expect—”
“I know. I should have reached out sooner. Years sooner.” She glanced at Sophie. “But I heard about what happened. And I had to come.”
“How did you find me?”
“Katherine Chen. I called her office and explained who I was. She gave me your address.” Evelyn smiled. “She’s protective of you. I like her.”
I didn’t know what to say.
Evelyn stepped closer, her eyes on Sophie.
“May I?”
I nodded.
She knelt beside the carrier, looking at my daughter with such tenderness it made my throat tight.
“She looks like your father,” Evelyn said softly. “Same nose. Same chin.”
“I thought I was alone,” I whispered. “After Dad died, I thought—”
“You were never alone, sweetheart. I just—” Evelyn stood, her eyes bright with tears. “I didn’t know how to reach you. You were so closed off after David died. And then you married Richard, and I thought maybe you were happy. Maybe you’d moved on.”
“I wasn’t happy,” I said quietly. “I was just trying to survive.”
“I know that now.” Evelyn reached out and took my hand. “And I’m sorry I wasn’t there. But I’m here now. If you’ll have me.”
Something inside me cracked.
All the loneliness I’d been carrying. All the years of thinking I had no family.
“Yes,” I managed. “Yes, I’d—I’d like that.”
Evelyn pulled me into a hug, and I let myself be held.
For the first time since my father died, I had family.
Real family.
Not by blood alone, but by choice.
