Tash had come out of the bathroom and was looking at them curiously.
Lily looked at her beautiful daughter who had not a shred of her or Becky, Will or Sarah but was absolutely all Nate.
Tash Jacobs was a bright child, fearfully bright. A genius, her teacher’s said, which was another reason Lily had no money. Anything extra she was setting aside in hopes of getting Tash into a special school for gifted children.
This, Fazire believed, came from Lily. This, Lily
knew
, came from Nate. Tash had exactly the same way of cutting to the meat of the matter as Nate had.
On this thought, Lily made her decision.
She smiled at her daughter. “Mummy needs to go see some friends. She’ll be back soon.”
“Lily –” Fazire said in a dire, warning tone.
Lily looked at him with determination. “I’ll be back soon.”
And then before her genie could speak another word, she was off.
* * * * *
“You are… fucking… kidding me.”
Laura did not like it when Victor cursed. However, if there ever was a time to curse, now was that time.
As luck would have it (or not, depending on how you looked at it), Nate had come home with Victor. So Laura thought she might as well tell them both at the same time. Nate had to know anyway and it might as well come from his mother. And by the look of things, Victor would not have imparted the information nearly as thoughtfully as Laura did.
Victor looked like he was about to hit the roof.
Nathaniel, sitting opposite Laura with one ankle resting casually atop the opposite knee, looked like he could happily commit murder.
However he would do it in a very cool, very controlled, manner.
One look at her son and Laura began to feel a creeping concern.
And it all had to do with that joyous look.
Lily had been happy to see her.
That may have been an act, of course. Moments before she’d looked horrified but Laura, well, Laura was beginning to have her doubts.
Why was Lily happy to see her? Especially considering the daughter she’d hid from them all for (Laura counted back, then couldn’t wrap her mind around it and just guessed) eight years was standing right there, the very vision of Nathaniel.
“I’m going to hunt that bitch down and I’m going to wring her white, hillbilly neck,” Victor threatened.
“Victor, calm down,” Laura soothed.
“I will not calm down! That’s my goddamned grandchild!” he shouted so loudly, the windows shook.
“What’s happening?”
Laura closed her eyes in despair,
this
they did
not
need. Danielle had taken that moment to walk into the room.
Her daughter had finally moved out, was living with a man that neither Victor nor Laura cared for but who all of them thought suited her. Nevertheless, she came home regularly and seemed to do it with an uncanny sense of when Nathaniel was there.
“Your mother has seen Lily,” Victor informed his daughter and Laura’s eyes flew open.
“Victor!” Laura didn’t think it was wise to bring Danielle into this drama. It wasn’t ever wise to bring Danielle into any drama. She created enough dramas on her own.
“Who?” Danielle had gone to sit on the arm of the chair where Nathaniel was sitting. Her son went momentarily still and then immediately stood and crossed the room. As usual, he made himself perfectly clear without uttering a single word.
“Lily, Lily, Lily!” Victor shouted, incensed. “That girl from backwater Indiana who left Nathaniel.”
Danielle’s eyes rounded and Laura, again with Mother Vision, noted that she looked somehow frightened.
Then the door bell rang.
“I’ll get it,” Danielle jumped up eagerly. Too eagerly.
“No! I’ll bloody well get it,” Victor shouted even though this was completely unnecessary.
Danielle shakily sat back down.
Laura dismissed her daughter, she’d deal with her later, and turned to look up at Nathaniel. He’d schooled his features but Laura saw they were still tight with anger
and
disbelief.
“You haven’t said a word,” she informed him.
“Nate
never
says a word,” Danielle mumbled and Laura had just enough time to shoot her daughter a killing look before the explosion came from the front hall.
“
You’ve got a fucking nerve!
” Everyone heard Victor shout and in moments they all rushed into the hall.
Nathaniel’s legs being longest and he being the swiftest meant he exited the room first. Danielle followed with Laura coming up the rear.
When Laura skidded to a halt in the entryway, she could not believe her eyes.
Victor had Lily in a death grip, both of his big hands wrapped around her upper arms and he held her imprisoned. She was staring up at him in complete shock.
“Victor, let her go!” Laura cried.
Then Lily’s head turned toward Laura’s voice.
And she saw Nathaniel.
And then something happened that Laura would never have guessed.
Lily’s eyes rounded then the expression on her face went funny, her mouth fell slack and every muscle in her body visibly tensed.
And then her lips came back together and she said, or mouthed as no sound came out, “Oh my God.”
Then Laura saw Lily’s face start to melt. It melted like it had when Lily had seen her in the park but this time it wasn’t an abandoned happiness, it started to be absolutely glorious.
But it stopped when Victor gave her a vicious shake and her head snapped back.
“Victor! I said to let her go,” Laura tried again.
He did immediately and she stumbled back and had to throw her arms out to stop herself from careening backwards out the front door. She just managed to catch herself on the door jamb.
“You bitch!” Victor yelled. “You take your silly, hick self out of my goddamned house and you better get yourself a damn fine lawyer because we’re getting that child. You’ve had her for eight years and we’re going to have her for the next eight!”
Lily’s head jerked up and she stared at Victor in shock.
“Wh… what?” she breathed in a barely-there voice.
Laura noted that Nathaniel had crossed his arms on his chest and was watching this drama like it was being staged for his personal amusement.
And he found it lacking.
Lily’s eyes flicked from Victor to Nathaniel and her pale face became bloodless when her eyes locked on Laura’s adopted son.
Then she spied Danielle and something seeped into her face. Something that was simply awful to see.
“You told me he was dead,” she whispered.
“Out!” Victor shouted, stepped forward and shoved her out the door with a hand on her chest. She went back several steps and Victor slammed the door in her face.
“Victor!” Laura screamed and ran to the door. Something was wrong, something was very wrong. She knew it, she sensed it. Her heart was racing and she became panicked. She
had
to get to Lily.
She clawed at the handle but Victor pulled her away.
“We have to hear what she has to say!” Laura yelled at her husband, yanked her arm free and jerked the door open.
And saw nothing but Lily running away.
Running for her very life.
Lily
“They’re here,” Jane called.
“Make them wait,” Alistair Hobbs replied.
Lily was looking out the window of Alistair’s conference room and ignoring this exchange between Alistair and his assistant, Jane.
Alistair Hobbs was a friend of a friend of Maxine’s. He was tall, slender and had ginger hair and eyebrows. In a vague way (as usual when it came to these sorts of things), Lily noted he was quite good-looking. Lily had met him at Maxine’s store, seen him in the market several times and they’d chatted. He’d asked her out once but she’d said no.
Lily never went out, ever. She didn’t have the time
or
the inclination.
Alistair didn’t seem to take offense to this. Regardless of his profession, he was a very nice man.
Maxine took offense to it, she thought Alistair was the bomb.
Now, as Lily was his client, it was a moot point. Alistair couldn’t ask her out again because he was her lawyer.
Or, at least he couldn’t ask her out for awhile.
She couldn’t afford him, of course. She couldn’t afford much of anything. She certainly couldn’t afford to go head-to-head with Nate and the entire Roberts Clan in a custody battle for Tash. Lily had no idea how rich they were but she knew from their homes, cars and clothes they had a
lot
more money than she did.
Lily, Fazire and Tash had no sooner got home to Somerset when Victor was good at his word and she received a letter, hand-delivered, from their attorneys.
Nate, alive and well, kicking and breathing and apparently angry, was going for full custody although
Lily
had no idea why
Nate
should be angry.
Lily
didn’t get her sister, had she had one, to brush off her unwanted boyfriend by telling him
she
was dead.
The letter said he wanted full and complete custody.
Nate was going to try and take her daughter from her.
Lily couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe Nate was even alive much less he would do something so vicious and cruel.
Granted, he had a daughter he knew nothing about for the first seven years of her life but that wasn’t Lily’s fault.
It had been only days since that humiliating scene in the Roberts’ entryway with Victor. The living, breathing Nate staring on like… like… she didn’t know what it was like. Like she was a creepy crawly and he was watching Victor scrunch her under his shoe.
Lily couldn’t figure it out, couldn’t manage to put even two of her thoughts together much less the number of thoughts it would take to figure out this mess.
Why?
Why, why, why?
She closed her eyes.
She knew why.
He had been finished with her. Just as he’d finished with his girlfriend Georgia. One second an item and talk of an engagement ring. The next second they were over.
Lily had to admit she was surprised they’d lasted as long as they did. Lily was not exactly in Nate’s league. She was an inexperienced virgin for one. For another she wasn’t beautiful and slim. And another, she was a sheltered Indiana girl and not a droll, cosmopolitan sophisticate.
She must have gotten very boring, very quickly.
Well, obviously she had.
When he heard the story, Fazire had been enraged. He was beside himself and Fazire beside himself was a sight to see.
He channelled all his genie friends in hopes of a wayward wish so he could turn Nate, Victor and the entire Roberts family into vermin and he was going to do it, he assured her, floating barely inches from the ceiling.
Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you looked at it, there weren’t any wayward wishes to be had. There never were, Lily’s family were the firsts in Genie History to hang on to their wishes
and
their genie.
And Lily wasn’t going to use her last wish for
that
.
She had bigger battles on her hands. Much bigger battles.
“Lily,” Alistair said softly.
Her eyes opened, her head shot up to look at him and he was smiling at her kindly.
“You know the plan?”
Lily nodded.
She knew the plan. She knew the plan but she hated the plan. She hated it with a passion.
But she’d do anything to keep Tash. Anything to keep her precious daughter.
Anything.
Alistair knew everything, her whole, sad, stupid, gullible story. Lily had told him every humiliating detail of her meeting with Nate and her life for the last eight years. Her difficult pregnancy; the bills; the state of her house when they’d moved there, not fit for Fazire and Lily much less a baby; the second jobs she had to get to put in decent wiring and plumbing, Lily herself doing most of the other work on the house; Lily’s saving up for Tash’s special school.
Everything.
When she was finished talking, Alistair stared at her a moment with a funny look on his face. Then he picked up a glass paperweight on his desk and threw it across the room. Lily wasn’t certain that was professional lawyer-type behaviour but she’d let it slide.
“Send them in,” Alistair called to his assistant and then turned back to Lily. “Don’t say anything, Lily. Just leave it to me.”
Lily nodded again.
She had thought about it in her rational moments, of which there were few, and she didn’t mind letting Nate have visitation rights though she wasn’t keen on Tash spending a great amount of time with Danielle or Victor or, indeed, Jeff. However, Tash needed a father and never expected to have one and didn’t even know she
did
have one… yet.