Page 61 of The Forsaken
“No, I won’t be returning to the institute for a while. The program has been renewed, so Rhys has three more episodes in the works. I’ll be quite busy after the baby comes. I hope Rhys allows me to take my maternity leave. You know how dogged he is.”
“I never thought I’d say this, but he cares about you, Quinn. He won’t push you too hard, especially since he’s now involved with your family. He might become your stepdad in time.”
“Rhys’s going to be a dad,” Quinn blurted out. It wasn’t really her news to share, but since Rhys had been seeing Sylvia and Jill knew all about the relationship, Quinn had some small right to discuss his affairs, in this instance.
Jill gasped. “You’re joking. Sylvia is pregnant? At her age?”
“No. He’s moving in with someone else. He’s not in love with Sylvia, so he thought it was time to move on. His girlfriend is an actress he met while making the program.”
“He certainly didn’t waste any time, did he?”
“He’s over the moon,” Quinn said, smiling when she recalled Rhys’s blissed-out expression.
“Well, I wish him luck. Having a newborn at fifty can’t be easy. I hope he’ll be a hands-on dad and not someone who just pops in, coos to the baby for five minutes, and then stares into his phone for the rest of the night. Does he love the mother?”
“I think so. He’s really excited.”
“How’s Sylvia taking it?”
“I have no idea. I haven’t spoken to her. We’ve had a bit of a situation.”
“Do tell,” Jill urged. “What has she done now?”
“She had twins and didn’t tell me I have a sister.” Quinn was no longer smiling. Tears of hurt filled her eyes, and she grabbed a pillow from the sofa and wrapped her arms around it for comfort.
“She what? Please tell me you’re joking.”
“I’m not. I found out completely by accident. There’s a woman out there called Quentin who is my twin sister.”
“Do you know where she is?” Jill asked. All the humor gone from her voice, she sounded stunned and subdued.
“No. Sylvia never bothered to look for her. She left the baby at a hospital because she had trouble breathing, and never looked back. My sister might have died, for all I know.”
“Oh, Quinn! How awful for you. Is there anything I can do?”
“Just be there for me when I need a good cry.”
“I’m always here. You can cry as much as you like. But seriously, what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to look for her. How can I not?”
“I can’t wait to meet her. Have you told your parents?” Jill asked. Jill’s father and Quinn adoptive father were brothers, so Jill was acutely aware of how this news might affect her aunt and uncle.
“No, I haven’t. Finding Sylvia and then Seth was difficult enough for them. They feel threatened, especially my mum, even though I told them time and again that no one could ever replace them in my affections. They think they weren’t enough somehow. They were always enough, but I just had to fill in the blanks. And now I have,” Quinn added bitterly.
“Seems like there’s one more giant blank you need to fill.”
“And I will, but I’m not going to say anything to Mum and Dad until I know more. So please don’t mention anything to your parents. I don’t want Mum and Dad to find out just yet.”
“My lips are sealed. I haven’t been speaking to my mum and dad as often as I used to,” Jill confessed.
“Why not?”
“Because I’m getting older and they are worried about my future, a topic that creeps up in every conversation. I’m in my thirties, unmarried, childless, and the proprietor of a failing business. My mum never stops reminding me that by the time she was my age, she had three children.”
“Times were different.”
“Yes, they were, but this is the only reality they understand. ‘You’d better get a move on, old girl, or it’ll be too late. Mark my words. Your brothers are younger than you, and they have six children between them.’ That’s what Dad said to me last time we spoke. You’d think there’s a line of willing men outside my door and I’m just refusing them all on principle. If Brian asked me to marry him, I would. And I would gladly produce a baby nine months later, but times have changed, and now men want to taketheir future wives out for a test drive before they commit to a lifelong lease. I bet Brian will want to live together for several years before he finally decides it’s time to make things legal. He’s not in a rush. His biological clock is not ticking like an undetonated Wehrmacht bomb.”
