"Fantino woke up earlier. It's just a matter of time before Joyce does," Annette said, believing it.
She had to believe it.
"What? Fantino's awake?" Lynette asked in shock and then she looked at Annette accusingly. "Why weren't we told?"
"By we you mean?" Carlo asked in a tone that wasn't exactly friendly.
Lynette didn't seem to notice. "Me and my parents. Joyce's family. Fantino is my brother-in-law."
"Annette is also Joyce's family, but as long as you refuse to acknowledge that you cannot expect to be in either my parents or my favor." It was a warning, clear as day.
Annette heard it. Lynette did too because the look she shot Annette was positively venomous.
"There are things you don't know," she said to Carlo. "Besides, she is the woman who jilted you at the altar five years ago and humiliated you in the process. Or had you forgotten?"
"I have forgotten nothing, least of which the role you played in the social and tabloid media storm that followed.
Lynette sucked in a breath, her mouth opening and closing like a fish. She was so obviously trying to think of what to say to spin the past in a different light, Annette almost felt sorry for her. Almost.
But while Lynette was undoubtedly a good sister to Joyce, she was not a nice person.
"As to apprising you of my brother's improved condition, my father called yours earlier today."
"Oh!" Lynette grabbed her phone out of her bag and said a word they would have been punished for uttering as teens. "I had my phone on silent. Dad texted me."
Annette knew she had gotten no similar text, but chose to believe that was because Alceu had told her father that she already knew.
Lynette turned to go, but before she could leave the room, Carlo said, "I know Annette is adopted and I know why. That does not reflect badly on her, but your family's behavior reflects very poorly on all of you."
The brunette spun and stared. "You told him?" she demanded of Annette, accusation in every syllable. "That's a family matter."
"That I am adopted is apersonalmatter and who I choose to tell is none of your business." Annette was done pretending her past was something to be ashamed of or hidden.
"But nobody wanted you. Why would you want people to know that?" Lynette asked, incomprehensibly.
"Our parents wanted me, or at least the money I could bring them. It was their choice not to love me, but that is not my fault." And finally, Annette believed that, to the very core of her.
Whatever was lacking in her family's feelings toward her, it came from a dearth in their own hearts, not in her.
"I didn't want a sister," Lynette said baldly. "Joyce was different, she was a cute baby and full of smiles for me, but you? That first year, you were either crying, or quiet and sullen. You ignored me."
"And you couldn't stand that." Annette shook her head. "It never occurred to you that I'd lost both my parents within a year of each other and the grief was overwhelming."
"I was six. Of course, I didn't think about that."
"But you are no longer six," Carlo pointed out.
"No." Lynette shook her head. "I got in the habit of resenting you and it never went away."
"We don't ever have to be friends, but maybe you could work on not being such a complete mess of a human?" Annette suggested.
"I'm not a mess. I just don't like you."
About to quip that the feeling was entirely mutual, Annette cast a quick glance toward the bed, guilt immediately wracking her for having this discussion at her sister's bedside. What she saw nearly sent her to her knees.
Joyce's eyes were open. And they were clear. Her hand not tethered to an I.V. was moving toward her face like she wanted to grab the apparatus there.
Annette leaped toward the bed, but her hand was gentle when she put on her sister's wrist. "Don't. They'll take it out for you. You are okay. It is all going to be okay."