The High Price of Secrets(75)

                A gnarled hand on her arm, accompanied by the reek of stale cigarettes, made her flinch.

                “You heard that, didn’t you?” Gladys rasped. “Are you all right, lovey?”

                Tamsyn could only shake her head.

                “’spected as much. It was only a matter of time before someone let something slip.”

                “I have to go,” Tamsyn finally managed to say through numb lips.

                “I’ll take care of things,” Gladys said with a look of understanding in her rheumy eyes that was just about Tamsyn’s undoing. “For what it’s worth, we’re all very sorry about your mum.”

                Afterward she didn’t remember actually driving from town back to Finn’s house. All she remembered was sitting in his office, the office of the man who’d known all along that her mother was in a hospital in Wellington, dying, and who had kept that information from her. Honor? Promises? Love? They could all be damned. This situation went beyond a vow, beyond loyalty to another man.

                Anger kept her from falling apart as she methodically checked every hospital in the book until she struck pay dirt. Her glow of success was short-lived, hitting a wall when the patient-inquiries staff wouldn’t give her the status of her mother’s health, insisting she was not on the authorized list of family members.

                More research turned up a flight to Wellington that would take a half hour. She sank back in the chair. All this time her mother had been just across Cook Strait, a short hop in a plane. Determination saw her book the last seat on the next flight out, and kept her sane as she drove to Blenheim airport.

                * * *

                “I’m sorry, miss, but we cannot disclose the patient’s details.” The young woman behind the patient-inquiries window was sympathetic but adamant.

                “Can you at least tell me if she’s still alive?” Tamsyn pleaded.

                “Please, I will be forced to call security if you don’t leave. I’ve told you all I can.”

                “But you’ve told me nothing! She’s my mother and she’s dying. I just want to know if I’m too late to even see her one last time. Is that too much to ask?”

                Tamsyn’s voice bordered on the hysterical and the clerk reached for her phone, her hand hovering over one quick-dial button in particular.

                “Miss, I understand this is distressing for you, but my instructions are quite clear.”

                Tamsyn tore herself away from the window, utter dejection dragging down every cell in her body. She looked toward the elevator bank and weighed the prospect of visiting every floor in the hospital, trailing through each ward searching for the room that had her mother’s name on the door. She’d begun to move toward the elevators when the doors of one car opened and her heart jumped in her chest.

                Finn. All the breath in her lungs disappeared on a whoosh. There was an older man with him, she noticed, and a woman perhaps a little younger than herself. Lorenzo Fabrini and his daughter, Alexis. Chills ran through Tamsyn’s body as she recognized them both from the photos at the house, as she laid eyes on her sister in person for the very first time.

                Alexis lifted a tissue to her eyes with one hand, wiping fiercely; the other was tucked firmly into the crook of her father’s arm. From here, Tamsyn couldn’t be sure who was supporting whom. Suddenly the ramifications of what she viewed struck home. The older man’s eyes were red-rimmed, as were Finn’s, and Alexis still wept. It was still visiting hours—they wouldn’t have left Ellen entirely alone unless…unless…