“Thanks. What brings you over here so early?” Hope asked.
“I missed you,” he said, pulling her in for a kiss. “I wanted to see if I could grab you for lunch later on.”
“I think that could be arranged,” she said, grinning up at him.
The sound of a throat clearing drew both their attention. Grayson looked up to see his father standing a few feet away.
“Dad! What are you doing here?” he asked, anger evident in his tone.
Tanner let out a sigh. “This seems to be your favorite place these days. I told you I needed to talk to you, son. I’m leaving town tomorrow.”
Grayson threw his hands in the air. “Talk, dad. Get it off your chest.”
“I think we should find a private place,” Tanner said, shifting his gaze toward Hope.
“Anything you want to say can be said in front of Hope,” Grayson said through clenched teeth.
“No! Let me give you some privacy,” Hope said, moving away from them.
“Hope. Please stay,” Tanner asked. “I think Grayson might need some moral support.”
“What does that even mean?” Grayson asked, his brow furrowed with confusion.
“Grayson. Listen to me! Hattie Alexander was not my birth mother. Samuel Blythewood was not my birth father. You have no actual ties to Miss Hattie, the Alexander family or Savannah House.” He waved a piece of paper in the air. “And I have the documents to prove it.”
Grayson heard his father’s statement through a gray haze. His first reaction was anger. What game was Tanner playing? Was he so angry at Grayson for coming to Savannah and taking his personal documents that he’d decided to lash out at him in this way? With a lie?
He shook his head, unwilling to believe his father. “No. I don’t believe you. I have your birth certificate with her name on it along with Samuel’s name. How do you explain that?
“I told you half-truths. I did meet Hattie Alexander.”
His father’s words exploded like a grenade in the stillness of the morning.
“What?” Grayson exploded. “How could you have lied to me about something so important?”
“Hear me out, son. It’s a tangled story. I didn’t get my hands on my actual birth certificate until I revved up my search efforts five years ago. I’d attempted to obtain the records before then but due to the adoption laws I wasn’t able to make any headway. That’s when I was able to access my birth records and discovered the name of my birth parents. I did some research and discovered Samuel Blythewood had passed away. I then hit pay dirt when I tracked down Hattie Alexander. It took me a while to make contact, but I did. She agreed to meet me at this park in Savannah. When she saw me, she started to cry. At first I thought she was crying happy tears or maybe guilty tears.”
“She took a long look at me and said there’d been some kind of a mistake. She said I wasn’t her son.” Tanner shook his head. “Hattie Alexander knew I wasn’t her son. Patrick was his name. She said he was a red head. Bright red hair and little freckles.” Tanner shrugged. “She knew I wasn’t him.”
Grayson shook his head. He was stunned. “Hair colors change. That doesn’t mean anything.”
“I didn’t know what she meant but she kept repeating it over and over, then she began to softly cry. She told me there had been a mistake and I wasn’t her son. It was devastating to have her walk away from me like that.”
“You told me you never met her,” Grayson said, his features furrowed with confusion. “Why did you lie to me?”
**
Hope reached out and squeezed Grayson’s arm for support. The tension in the air was thick and stifling. She was seeing a side of Grayson that was foreign to her. And it scared her. Everything seemed to be unraveling at the speed of light. Grayson’s expression gutted he
r. He was trying desperately to make sense of this stunning story.
Tanner looked directly at Grayson. “You asked me if I’d ever met my mother. I gave you a truthful answer, son. Hattie Alexander was not my mother.”
“That’s not what that birth certificate says!” Grayson exploded.
I think she knew,” Tanner said, wiping a tear from his face.
“Knew what?” Grayson asked.