That’s how Maggie became ours. It was an adjustment, at first, but we joyfully made it. I cared for her in the mornings while Brian wrote. When I opened the store at ten, he took over the childcare duties. At noon, after she had her lunch, Brian brought Maggie to the store, where she napped in the back room. I’d found a new assistant—a lovely senior named Joyce, who was more than capable of managing customers while I tended to my daughter’s needs. At the end of my shift, I took Maggie home for dinner, a bath, and bed. I was exhausted but happy. The baby was happy, too. She never made strange with us; she never seemed to miss Freya and Max. It was like she, too, knew this was where she belonged.

Two weeks after we became parents, a manila envelope arrived at Hawking Mercantile. I barely glanced at the unfamiliar return address; I knew it was from Max’s lawyers. These would be the documents required to make our parenthood official. Excitedly, I slid my thumb under the sealed flap and pulled out the pages. But they weren’t custody papers. They were the results of Maggie’s paternity test.

We didn’t need them now. Maggie was our child and biology was irrelevant. And Brian wouldn’t thank me for going behind his back, for ignoring his advice. I would destroy the report, put it through a shredder or toss it in the fire. But first . . . I had to look.

It stated, unequivocally, that Maggie was not Brian’s child.

I sat down heavily on the stool behind the till. Maggie was Max’s daughter. Freya had been fighting to keep her child from us because we had no claim to her. But Freya had lied about the date of conception. Faked the ultrasound images. Perhaps she’d been unsure of her daughter’s paternity, too. But now, I knew the truth. As I slipped the papers back into the envelope, I wondered if Freya had had other lovers I didn’t know about. But no . . . we had been friends when Maggie was conceived. I would have known if she had been sleeping with other men.

Joyce must have noticed my shock, because she asked, “Are you okay?”

I forced a smile. “I’m fine.”

And I was fine. This didn’t matter. This didn’t change anything. The adoption papers would arrive soon, and Maggie would be legally ours. One day, she would want to know about her birth parents, might want to test her DNA. One day, we would bring Max back into his daughter’s life, but not now.

Now, she was ours.

Chapter 70

70

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