Afterglow

alive

I stared down at Jessie, my birth father. The man that I used to think was responsible for Ian and Leah's deaths and the continuous harassment and torment of me and my entire family and friends.

Instead, he turned out to be the person who'd saved me from dying an untimely death at the hands of my birth mother, albeit accidentally, but she'd still had the gun trained on me for the better part of the entire confrontation where I'd learned the truth, well, most of it.

That was the point of this brunch meeting, with Lachlan sitting dutifully by my side, mostly considering we still didn't trust Jessie one hundred percent, but hopefully that could change in the future. This was my shot, my chance to learn about who I'd come from, and I wondered just how many things I'd inherited from him.

Was my allergy to grass (weird, I know) hereditary from his side, or was it from Luciana? Was my proclivity for coffee over tea nature or nurture? I had so many questions swimming around in my brain, but the more pertinent ones deserved front row attention.

"Why come back into my life, and why use my mom as your way to do that? You could've just reached out and said you wanted to have contact, especially since I've been wanting to find my birth parents for the better part of my life," I asked him, eyes squinting from the slanting sunlight being cast through the little cafe's windows, the golden, buttery light illuminating the dark shadows cast across Jessie's tired face.

He blew out a breath of air while his hands circled his steaming cup of coffee, two sugars and a splash of cream, in stark contrast to my coffee filled to the absolute brim with multiple sugars and cream, the liquid so milky it was more sweetener than actual coffee, but that was how I had always enjoyed the beverage.

"You were getting older and I found out that you wanted to know your birth parents through your dad, who'd given me a job after I ran into some legal trouble with Luciana. It was her idea to launder money, and while I did probation for the crime, she was the one who had masterminded it all, before her mental health started failing. I'd been in love with Luciana and she was my wife, but I caught her a few times smoking while she was pregnant with you, and so I made a vow to stay with her throughout the entire pregnancy to make sure she couldn't harm you, and when you were born, we gave you up to your parents, and yes they made it seem like a business deal, giving me a job right after and a visa to the U.S., but it wasn't like that at all.

"Your parents were desperate for a baby, and the process in the U.S. was taking too long. Luciana couldn't be a mother in prison and I couldn't be a proper father just getting myself up off the ground. Your father helped me make a name for myself in the financial industry and build my career from the ground up, to make a life that could make my daughter proud. Luciana slowly lost her mind in prison, so they moved her to a mental facility and I went to visit her every few months, telling her everything that your parents would tell me about you. She never got over the fact that she had to give you up, she blames me for it because I got off on the charges while she was stuck in jail. I came back now because I reconnected with your mother after I made a name for myself, and after she divorced your father. She's always wanted you to know me, we've been friends all your life.

"It was your father who didn't want me to ever come around you, scared that you would figure out who I was to you before you turned eighteen which was when he wanted you to finally find out the truth."

Jessie rubbed at his five o'clock shadow while Lachlan brushed some of my hair off my shoulder and rested his hands across it, that simple action spurring my heart to flutter a little in my chest while I tried to concentrate on what he was saying.

"Why did Luciana's family tell me that you...forced Luciana to have me? In more ways than one," I alluded, coding my words to make them a bit more civil in the calm coffee shop atmosphere.