Dylan cracked up.
“Shut up, Dylan.” Reese muttered.
“Hey, I didn’t say it. But Quinn’s pretty funny.”
When she realized how rude she’d been, Quinn quickly apologized. “I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve that. I’m not usually so insulting, but…I’m upset. How could Gloria do it, just give away her baby to a monster like Alana?”
Jake shook his head. “All these years you think you know someone. Gloria doesn’t seem the type that would relinquish her child to a psycho like Alana, move three thousand miles away, and just abandon her to that kind of environment. But Gloria had to know what Alana was like. They were sisters. And she told me the other day that every time she’d talked to Kit over the phone she sounded sad. Well, in that kind of situation, yeah, I’d say the kid was sad. And what did Gloria ever do about it? Nothing. Just like John Griffin did nothing.” John Griffin’s name had been listed in the space under Father. At least Kit hadn’t been lied to about that, thought Jake. But at the moment, he was livid. Like Quinn, he wondered what the knowledge would do to Kit. How much more could she take?
Even though Quinn knew she had to get back to work, she was reluctant to go. She swore when her pager went off for the second time. But before she left, she had to know, “Who’s going to tell her?”
Hoping it wouldn’t be her job, she wasn’t about to volunteer, but Baylee had a point to make. “You know, she trusted Gloria. There was a time when she was small that she thought her Aunt Gloria was her fairy godmother. I suspect when she finds this out, this is going to break her heart.”
Jake looked around the table. Every eye turned on him. “Now wait a minute, why me? If it’s all the same to you, I think Gloria should be the one to step up to the plate and tell her. What about you, Baylee?”
“Good idea, but who confronts Gloria?”
“Oh, I don’t have a problem confronting Gloria. In fact, I’ll relish the moment. Who wants to go with me?”
While everyone else looked away, Baylee was the only one to maintain eye contact.
As the only mother here, she knew firsthand about holding her own child for the first time.
“I can’t wait to see her face when we confront her.”
CHAPTER 24
Baylee stood on the path connecting Gloria’s house and the guest cottage, waiting for Jake to get out of his car. She’d made arrangements for Tanya to stay with Sarah long enough for her and Jake to meet with Gloria.
For fifteen minutes, over the phone, they’d discussed strategy, only to decide the situation required a simple and direct approach. Surprise was on their side since they’d decided not to call Gloria and tip their hand. There was no small talk between Jake and Baylee, only steely eyed determination as they made their way up to the front door.
Jake rang the doorbell and the moment the door opened Gloria acted as if she knew something was up. As she led them into her living room, Jake noticed the condition of the place and understood that Auslo and Taft had finally gotten around to searching Gloria’s house. From the looks of the damage it had been recent.
“When did this happen, Gloria?”
“When I got back from the hospital last night the house was like this. Someone turned every plant in the house over, broke things, sentimental things that belonged to Morty. It’s taken me all morning just to put the kitchen right again. Would either of you like a cup of tea?”
“We didn’t come for tea, Gloria. But thanks.”
Gloria started toward the kitchen anyway, until Jake commanded, “Sit down, Gloria. Please. No one wants tea or coffee; we came here to talk to you. It’s important we have your full attention.”
She recognized the tone to his voice, his body language, his demeanor. He was angry with her.
Trembling now, almost in tears, she nervously sat down. “What’s this about? Has something happened to Kit?”
Gloria watched Jake pull out a piece of paper from his pocket, unfold it, and hand it off to her. When she saw that he wanted her to read what was on the paper, she grabbed her glasses from the end table, adjusted them on her nose, and turned white after only a few seconds.
“God. No. No. No. Where did you get this? Has Kit seen this? Oh no, Kit.”
Mortified, she started sobbing uncontrollably.
Unmoved by her tears, Jake scoffed, “Obviously, you didn’t think anyone would ever see this. You want to tell us about it, Gloria?”
In between sobs, she tried to explain. “You must think I’m such a terrible person, but I’m not. It isn’t what you think. I never gave Kit up. It was Alana. Alana took her away from me when she was born. After I gave birth, she had me admitted to a psychiatric ward three thousand miles away in Maine. She and Jessica saw to it that I was locked up in a mental hospital for almost eighteen months after Kit was born.”
She waved the birth certificate toward Jake and Baylee and hurriedly went on, “I kept the hospital release form with the date on it so that she’ll know. She’ll know I’m telling the truth. She’ll have to believe me. The day she was born, Jessica filed papers in court for Alana to adopt her, said I was an unfit mother, that I was crazy. Jessica made certain it was all legal. They took her away from me in the hospital. I never got to hold her…my baby daughter. I never got to name my own child.
“That first day, I waited for the nurses to bring her to me. I asked every nurse that came through the door about my baby. But nobody would tell me anything. I began to suspect that maybe something was wrong with her and they didn’t want me to see her. At some point, they must have drugged me because days later I woke up three thousand miles away in Bar Harbor, Maine, at a private psychiatric hospital called Sierra Manor, where I stayed until they let me out eighteen months later.
“You have to believe me. I have the paper to prove I was there.” Wild sobs poured out of Gloria making her a little incoherent.
Jake and Baylee watched as she suddenly started talking as if Kit were in the room, rocking back and forth, trying to explain everything all over again. “I never got to be your mother. Alana and Jessica stole you from me. I wanted so much to be your mother but they took you away. It’s haunted me. It’s haunted me for years. I was locked up, don’t you see, three thousand miles away.”
Baylee and Jake exchanged exasperated looks. It was Baylee who said, “I suppose it’s possible. We all know what a cruel streak Alana had. But why? Why did she take your baby from you, Gloria? She had the maternal instincts of a viper. No, scratch that, she had zero maternal instincts. Why would she want a baby?”
Through tears, Gloria sobbed. “She wanted to get back at me. She and John dated off and on for years. It was never serious between them. They’d always end up at each other’s throats. John liked me though. We started seeing each other. One thing led to another, and we had an affair that lasted about a year. When Alana found out she went nuts. The idea that John preferred me over her was unthinkable. Alana and I argued over John. And when I got pregnant, from the moment she found out about it, she was horrible to me. Then a couple of months later, out of the blue she came to see me, offered me a place to stay, said I could move in with her until the birth. She and Jessica must have plotted it all out for months, planned every detail. I was so stupid to believe she’d had a change of heart.
“That night I went into labor, she and Jessica drove me to the hospital. I had no idea what they planned to do. I swear I didn’t know. If I’d known I would have gone somewhere, anywhere, left L.A., but I didn’t know they intended to steal my baby. You believe me don’t you, Baylee?”
Because she’d known the woman for years, Baylee tried to give Gloria the benefit of the doubt. “It sounds like something Alana would do. But Gloria the adoption had to be illegal unless you signed something relinquishing the baby.”
The look that crossed Gloria’s face had Baylee’s stomach dropping.
“They said I did, the people at the psychiatric hospital told me every time I brought up the subject of my baby. I’d te
ll them what happened and they’d look at me sympathetically and calmly explain that I’d given up my baby for adoption and that I was simply having regrets. The doctors and nurses would tell me that I’d signed adoption papers giving my baby away. But I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t have done that.”
Baylee looked skeptical. “What about confronting Alana and Jessica after you got out of the hospital, Gloria, coming back to L.A., just showing up on their doorstep, getting in their faces?” It’s what she would have done, she noted. If anyone had taken Sarah away from her like that, but then, she thought, she hadn’t been locked up in a mental ward for eighteen months.
“Don’t you think I wanted to? When they finally let me out of the hospital, I was broke, didn’t even have money for a bus ticket back to L.A. So, I found a job, went to work as a maid at a bed and breakfast about five miles from the hospital. I saved every dime I made to get her back, but it never seemed to be enough. I knew I couldn’t compete with Alana’s money or Jessica’s legal expertise. One afternoon I was so depressed I walked into a law office downtown to get legal advice. That’s how I met Morty. He was so nice to me. He listened to my story and decided to contact Jessica, one attorney to another. But after he talked to her, he told me it was too late. Jessica and Alana swore it was a legal adoption, that I’d signed papers. Morty told me there was nothing I could do. I cried for a week.”
It suddenly occurred to Jake after listening to Gloria talk, how much she and Kit looked alike, the same skin tone, the same hair coloring, and the same mannerisms, the same chatty way they talked. How had he missed their similarities over the years? Watching her now, the resemblance between the two women was uncanny.
But there was something Jake needed to know. “What about Kit’s father, Gloria? What about John Griffin? Where was he while all of this was happening?”
“He was of no help to me either. When Kit was born, he was out of the country on location. He wasn’t around during my pregnancy. By the time he got back to L.A., Alana had Kit. Jessica made sure of that. And I was out of the picture. They convinced John that I had abandoned the baby, disappeared shortly after Kit was born, that I’d signed the papers for Alana to adopt her. He said he tried to find me. Even if he had tried, he wouldn’t have been able to find a trace of me. They convinced him that I had willingly given her up for adoption, willingly given her away to Alana and just disappeared. From what he told me years later, Alana played her part very well, acted as if she had done such a noble thing by giving her a home so she wouldn’t end up in foster care. John believed all of it without question.
“But he wanted to be around Kit. That’s something Lana and Jess never counted on. And legally, he was her father. So they couldn’t very well keep him completely out of the picture. Every now and then, they let him visit whenever he was in the mood to play daddy. It wasn’t until after Morty and I married, when I had some money, that I paid Alana a surprise visit. By that time Kit was about three.”
At the memory, she let out a gasp. “I found Kit…she had…her arm was in a cast…her arm had been broken. She didn’t know who I was of course, but when I asked her how she had hurt her arm, she told me, Alana had a temper tantrum and threw her down the stairs. I was horrified. I went to Morty, I begged him to do something. So he got back in touch with Jessica, sat down with her, and reviewed all the adoption papers. He found everything in order, nothing he could do he said. I’d just have to learn to be my daughter’s aunt. But because Kit had said how mean Alana was to her, I tracked down John in Europe and asked him to do something, to take Alana to court, get Kit away from her.
“Finally, after several more broken bones, he petitioned the court. But the next thing I knew he’d withdrawn his petition. It seems Alana financed one of his films.”
She sobbed again before going on, “Alana bought him off. There’s no other way to say it. I suspect over the years, it happened quite often.”
Sickened at the newfound knowledge, Baylee told Jake, “Even as a kid, I suspected it was something like that.”
“Me too. It’s the only reason that made any sense. She kept buying him off, dangling the money to produce and finance his films as the incentive not to fight for custody. It worked once when Kit was five, so why not keep financing his damned movie career while at the same time keeping him under her thumb. Either way it was a win-win situation for both of them. The only one who lost was Kit.”
“And knowing Alana, she had to get off on the control factor, knowing she could control him with the money anytime she wanted. The night she shot Kit, he must have upped his demands and she went ballistic, wanted to prove a major point.”
“At Kit’s expense,” Jake finished for her. She’d been twelve years old that night, he reminded himself. That caused a tidal wave of anger to build up in him.
“And when exactly where you planning on telling Kit the truth, Gloria?”
Kit had just finished taking her first walk around the fifth floor still attached to her IV drip, when she practically collapsed back on her bed from exhaustion. She was still trying to catch her breath and let the dizziness pass when she looked up and saw Dylan stationed in her doorway. After telling her he needed to take care of something, Jake had been gone all of five minutes and now, here was Dylan, dutifully taking his turn as guard dog.
Smiling, in spite of the fatigue, she muttered, “Your turn to watch me, huh?”
Dylan grinned. “We can’t have you getting in trouble again, now can we?” He’d volunteered to take a shift, but now he noted how pale Kit looked. He approached the bed and asked, “Are you okay? Can I get you something?”
“Some water would be nice,” she said, as she fell back into the mountain of pillows.
He poured water from a plastic carafe and handed her a cup, only to realize that when she took it, her hands were shaking. It was then he noticed the pain on her face. Glancing at the IV, he reminded her, “Don’t hurt. That’s what it’s there for. Go for it.”
When she laughed, Dylan saw past the bruises and knew what Jake had found in her, a gentle soul who seemed genuinely in love with him.
“Are you going to tell me where Jake went?”
He stuck his hands in his pocket and grinned again. He was there to look out for her while Baylee and Jake confronted Gloria. He wasn’t about to give anything away. So, he wiggled his eyebrows back and forth, and opened up a new avenue for discussion. “What can you tell me about Baylee? Is she seeing anyone?”
Kit choked on the water, but motioned for him to take a chair. “Oh Dylan, we so need to talk.”
When Jake walked into the room, he found Dylan, sitting cozily beside Kit’s bed, chatting like the two were old friends. She looked up, spotted Jake, and gave him a come hither grin, cocked her head to one side, and said, “Give us a kiss.”
Jake noticed it was a fair attempt at an Irish accent. It was then he noticed how sauced Kit acted. In protective mode now, Jake turned accusingly to Dylan. “What did you do to her?”
But it was Kit, with a slur to her speech, who tried to explain, “We’ve been getting to know each other. He’s been telling me about his visit to Ireland several years back. Donegal, wasn’t it? Up there it’s different, right Dylan? I told him about the brother I’ve never met in Galway. He’s been telling me how we should all go to Ireland, see the countryside. Quinn was born there you know.” She actually giggled.
But Jake glanced over at Dylan, saw him get to his feet. Dylan simply smiled at the hint of jealousy on Jake’s face and pointed to the IV drip. “Wish I could say it was the Burke charm, but the drug’s making her loopy. She was up walking when I got here. It seemed to take everything out of her. When she fell back to bed she started pushing the pain button.”
Jake couldn’t help himself, he laughed. He needed something to laugh about after having to drag Gloria here kicking and screaming.
When Quinn walked through the door, quickly followed by Baylee, followed by a bleary-eyed Gloria, Dylan tried to excuse himself, but t
o his surprise Kit pointed a finger at him, and warned, “Oh, no you don’t. Something’s up. Look at this bunch. Can’t you tell?”
Finally, Quinn stepped to the side of the bed, checked the IV drip, and wanted to know, “How much Demerol have you had, Kit?”
“You told me to push the button, so I pushed it and pushed it and pushed it, but nothing came out.” She found that hilarious and started giggling again.
“Oh God,” Jake groaned. Alarmed, he started to say something else, but then Quinn shook her head. “She can’t get more out of the drip than she needs. It doesn’t work like that. It’s a micro drip with a very low dose.”
Worried, Baylee pointed out, “But she acts like she’s high.”
“Oh, she’s feeling no pain that’s for sure. Since she’s never taken anything stronger than ibuprofen she’s a little more susceptible than most.”
Jake said flatly, “I guess this isn’t the best time to do this.”
But to his surprise, Quinn suggested, “On the contrary, I think it’s the perfect time to drop the bombshell. She’s drugged enough it’ll take some of the sting out of it.” She shot Gloria a look of contempt.
Jake took Kit’s hand and cautioned, “Honey, Gloria’s got something she wants to tell you.”
Everyone made room for Gloria to stand next to Kit’s bed. “Glo, you don’t look so good. What’s wrong? Tell Kit what’s wrong.” She’d lost the Irish accent.
But when Gloria opened her mouth to speak, nothing came out. Kit leaned in to her, telling her, “You’ll have to speak up Glo, I can’t hear you.” She giggled like it was the funniest thing she’d said all day.
All of a sudden tears formed in Gloria’s eyes and water ran down her cheeks. Kit reached over with her good hand, took Gloria’s hand in hers, and then clumsily tried to wipe some of the tears from Gloria’s cheek. But the tears kept coming.
“I’ve done something bad, Kit, and I can never, ever undo it or take it back, but you have to know what I’ve done and why. It’s time you knew.” Gloria breathed deeply, looked around the room at everyone staring at her and then looked back into Kit’s face. As if her courage came from Kit, she reached to touch her cheek and took in another deep breath before saying, “It’s time you knew the truth.”
Just Evil (The Evil Secrets Trilogy) Page 33