Chapter 2 - The Photograph Changed Margaret’s Face
For several seconds, nobody moved.
The young woman remained in the doorway, one hand wrapped around an old
photograph, while cold November air pushed into the dining room behind
her.
David finally stepped aside. “You should come in.”
Margaret found her voice. “No.”
Everyone turned. She was gripping the back of the chair so tightly her
knuckles had gone white.
The young woman looked at her. “You are Margaret?”
“Yes.”
“My name is Hannah Reed.”
The name meant nothing to Laura, but Margaret reacted as if she had been
struck.
Hannah placed the photograph on the only clean corner of the dining
table. It showed a much younger Margaret, a brunette woman, and a tall
dark-haired man outside a lake house.
David stared. “That’s Dad.”
Margaret closed her eyes.
Hannah pointed to the brunette. “My mother, Catherine Reed. She died
last month.”
Then she pointed to the man.
“My mother said Margaret knew who my father was.”
Margaret shook her head. “Robert wasn’t your father.”
Hannah’s expression hardened. “She said you would say that.”
Before Margaret could answer, the doorbell rang again.
David opened it.
A blonde woman stood there holding a pie.
Laura recognized Natalie Brooks immediately from old photographs—David’s
former fiancée, the woman Margaret had planned to parade into
Thanksgiving dinner.
Natalie saw the destroyed table. “I came at a bad time.”
“You came exactly when Margaret planned,” Laura said.
Natalie looked confused.
Then she saw Hannah’s photograph.
The pie nearly slipped from her hands.
“Where did you get that?”
Hannah frowned. “It belonged to my mother.”
Natalie stepped closer and pointed at the man everyone thought was
Robert Whitmore.
“That isn’t Robert.”
David stared. “Yes, it is.”
“No. That was my father’s older brother.”
Margaret whispered, “Natalie, stop.”
Natalie looked directly at her.
“His name was Samuel Brooks.”
Hannah slowly turned toward Margaret.
“Was Samuel my father?”
Margaret’s face collapsed.
“Yes.”
The room went silent.
Then Hannah asked the question that hurt more.
“You knew for thirty-one years?”
Margaret lowered her eyes.
“Yes.”
And David realized the Thanksgiving secret was not merely about an
May you like
unknown daughter.
His mother had once been married to Hannah’s father.
