As they disembarked from the helicopter, Rachel had to pause for a moment before continuing into the hotel.

“Are you going to be okay?” Nick asked.

“I think so…it’s all happening too fast,” Rachel said. This was not how she had imagined it would happen. She didn’t really have a set vision of how things might unfold, but after the disappointment of her last two trips to China, she had begun to lose hope that she would ever find her father. Or else, it would happen years from now, after making a long, arduous journey to some far outpost. She never thought that she would meet him for the first time at a resort in Santa Barbara on the day before her wedding.

Rachel and her mother were led through the mimosa-scented lobby, then down a long Mediterranean-tiled corridor, and outside again. As they walked through the lush gardens toward one of the private cottage suites, Rachel felt as though she were floating through some strange, nebulous dream. Time seemed to have sped up, and everything seemed so unreal. It was all too bright, too tropical for such a momentous occasion. Before she could fully collect herself, they were at the front of the cottage, and Nick’s mother was giving the Mission-style wooden door a few rapid knocks.

Rachel took a deep breath.

“I’m right here with you,” Nick whispered from behind, giving her shoulder an affectionate squeeze.

The door was opened by a man with an earpiece who Rachel assumed was some sort of bodyguard. Inside the room was another man in an open-collared shirt and a pale yellow sweater vest, sitting in front of the fireplace. His rimless glasses framed a vibrant, fair-complexioned face, and his jet-black hair, meticulously combed with a part on the left, had a few graying streaks at the temples. Could this really be her father?

Kerry stood at the doorway hesitantly, but as the man got up and came toward the light, she suddenly put her hands to her mouth and let out a small gasp. “Kao Wei!”

The man came up to Rachel’s mother and stared into her face searchingly for a split second, before scooping her into a tight embrace.

“Kerry Ching. You are even prettier than I remember,” he said in Mandarin.

Kerry broke out in loud, violent sobs, and Rachel found her eyes flooding uncontrollably with tears as she watched her mother crying against the man’s chest. Managing to collect herself after a few moments, Kerry turned to her daughter and said, “Rachel, this is your father.”

Rachel couldn’t believe she was hearing those words. She stood by the doorway, suddenly feeling as if she were five years old again.

Standing outside the cottage, Eleanor turned to her son and said in a rather choked-up voice, “Come on, let’s give them some privacy.”

Nick, a little misty-eyed himself, answered, “That’s the best thing I’ve heard you say in a long time, Mum.”

11

FOUR SEASONS BILTMORE

SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA