“Let’s do this,” I said with more confidence than I felt.

Howard clicked on the menu option for viewing possible DNA matches. We held our collective breaths, and even Howard’s hand shook ever so slightly. The list was somewhat long and arranged by highest level of DNA shared to lowest.

The first name on the list hit me like a punch to the gut. I blinked several times as the screen swam in front of me. I stared hard at the top name, certain I was hallucinating or having a bad dream or needed to be locked up in the psych ward. All those options were preferable to the truth screaming through every brain cell in my skull. The room was so hot, so very hot. I was being smothered by the heat.

I’d expected to see a list of names I didn’t recognize. That wasn’t the case.

The room spun around me. I tried to focus, but I was looking down a long tunnel of blurry images from my past. My spine turned to mush, refusing to hold up my body. I leaned to one side, leaned more, and more. The chair tipped, and I fell into a black abyss of blissful nothingness.

I woke on the couch with Fran sitting beside me and Howard hovering in the background. Pillows elevated my feet.

“What happened?” I heard a shaky voice ask the question and looked around for the speaker before realizing that’d been my voice.

“You fainted, honey.” Fran ran a warm washcloth over my sweaty forehead.

“For how long?”

“Less than a minute. Just lie here and don’t try to get up just yet.”

I fainted? I’d never fainted in my life. As my body functions returned to normal, the reason behind my incident became all too clear.

I knew that top name on the list.

Rosalee Black.

Oh, my God.

“Honey, are you going to be okay? Do we need to call 911?” Fran and Howard leaned over me, both their faces lined with concern.

“No, no. I’ll be okay once the shock wears off.”

“You saw something. What was it?”

I closed my eyes to buy time, faking that I was resting. I didn’t want to tell her. She’d hate me. So would Howard. How could they not hate me? I’d lived a lie for six-plus years and hadn’t realized it. But my ignorance was no excuse for a cold, hard fact I should’ve seen. Neither child looked like Mark.

They looked like…

Him.

I’d never given it much thought. Never once questioned how Mark and I had the athletic ability of a slug, while the children were insanely talented athletes, even at their young age. And they were both natural-born skaters.

Of course they were.

“Caro, honey, are you okay?”

My eyes fluttered open, and I focused on those two worried faces in my line of vision. I had to tell them before they did their own research and figured it out. I wouldn’t let that happen. This was my story to tell, my transgression to admit.