But she could still foolishly hope that the man she was dangerously close to loving might change his mind. All the more reason to give him the gift of knowledge, whether he came around or not. “Elena, if you ever cared for Adan at all, I’m imploring you to please consider telling him what you know. Isn’t it time to put an end to the mystery and his misery?”
Elena sighed and stared off into space for a few moments before regarding Piper again. “This truth you are seeking will forever change him. He might never accept the mistakes the people in his life have made, even if those mistakes resulted in his very existence.”
Finally they were getting somewhere. “Then it’s true the queen had an extramarital affair that resulted in Adan’s birth.”
“No, that is not the case, but you are on the correct path.”
Reality suddenly dawned on Piper. “The king had an indiscretion?”
She shook her head. “He had the desire to give the queen what she could not have. A third child. That decision required involving another woman.”
“He used a surrogate?” Piper asked, unable to keep the shock from her voice.
“Yes. In a manner of speaking.”
“And you know the mother,” she said in a simple statement of fact.
Elena knitted her hands together and glanced away. “Very well.”
She doubted she would get an answer, but she still had to ask. “Who is she, Elena?”
The woman turned a weary gaze to her and sighed. “I am.”
Piper’s brief time in Bajul had been fraught with misunderstanding and mysteries and more than a few surprises. But this bombshell trumped every last one of them. “Who else knows about this?” she asked when she’d finally recovered her voice.
Elena pushed slowly out of the rocker and walked to the window to peer outside. “No one else until now.”
All these years, Adan had been living under the assumption that he was another man’s child. A supposition that had caused him a great deal of pain, though he had downplayed his burden. But Piper had witnessed it firsthand, and now she wanted nothing more than to finally give him the answers he’d been silently seeking for years. “You have to tell him, Elena.”
She turned from the window, a despondent look on her face. “I have pondered that for many years. I still am not certain it would be wise.”
Wise? Surely the former nanny wasn’t serious. “Adan deserves to know the truth from the woman who gave him life.”
“And he will hate me for withholding that truth for his entire life.”
“Why did you withhold it?”
Elena reclaimed the chair and perched on the edge of the cushioned seat. “The king requested that Adan’s parentage remain a secret, for both my sake and his.”
“You mean for the king’s sake, don’t you?” She hadn’t been able to tamp down the obvious anger in her tone, but she was angry. Livid, in fact.
“For all our sakes,” Elena replied. “And for the benefit of the queen, who was already suffering from the decision Aahil made to give her another child.”
“But I thought she wanted another baby.”
“She did, yet after Adan was born, she could not hold him. In fact, she wanted nothing to do with him. What was meant to give her solace only drove her deeper into depression.”
Piper was about to step out on a limb, even knowing it could break the revelations wide-open. “When Adan was conceived, was it through artificial means?”
Elena shook her head. “That process would have included medical staff, and we could not risk involving anyone who might reveal the truth.”
“Then Adan was conceived—”
“Through natural means.” Once again her gaze drifted away. “And after all was said and done, I am somewhat ashamed to say Aahil and I fell in love during the process, though he continued to be true to the queen until her demise. We remained devoted to each other until his death, and until last year, I kept our relationship a secret.”
That meant the king had slept with the governess for the sake of procreation to please his queen, resulting in a decades-long affair. A twisted fairy tale that needed to be untangled. “You said ‘until last year.’ Does that mean Adan knows you were involved with his father?”
“Yes,” she said quietly. “All the boys know. But they do not know I am Adan’s true mother.”
“It’s not too late to rectify the deception, Elena, especially now that Adan has a son. A grandson whom you can acknowledge if you’ll just tell Adan the whole story.”
Elena’s eyes began to mist with unshed tears. “I could not bear to tell him the rest for fear he’ll hate me.”
Piper leaned forward and clasped Elena’s hands. “You’re the only mother Adan has ever known, and it’s obvious he loves you very much. He might need time to adjust, but I’m sure he’ll eventually forgive you.”
“It is because of my love for him that I want to protect him from more pain. And you must promise me, Piper, that you will say nothing to him.”
The woman drove a hard bargain that could force a wedge between Piper and Adan should he ever learn she’d continued the ruse. “I’ll allow you to tell Adan, but—”
“Tell me what?”
Startled by Adan’s sudden appearance, Piper quickly shot to her feet. “We were just discussing...actually...”
“We were discussing Samuel’s care,” Elena said as she gave Piper a cautioning look.
“Am I doing something wrong?” Adan asked, sounding somewhat frustrated.
The lies would surely taste as bitter as brine going down. But it honestly wasn’t Piper’s place to enlighten him. “You’re doing a great job. I basically asked Elena to keep encouraging you when I’m no longer here.”
His expression turned somber. “We will discuss that following your departure. At the moment, I need to say goodbye to my son.”
Piper remained rooted to her spot as Adan walked to the crib and laid a gentle hand on Sam’s forehead. He looked so handsome in his navy flight suit, sunglasses perched atop his head and heavy boots on his feet. He also looked like the consummate father. And when he turned and came to her side, she desperately wanted to blurt out the truth.
Instead, she maintained an overly pleasant demeanor that inaccurately reflected her mood. “I guess we’ll see you tomorrow evening, right?”
“Yes, and hopefully not too late.” Then he brushed a kiss across her lips, as if this make-believe marriage had somehow become real. She
