I did not cry, standing there gripping the table.

I was too far past crying, out in some silent territory where the ground of your life rearranges itself.

But I felt, underneath the shock, the first loosening of a knot I had carried so long I had stopped feeling it as a knot and simply felt it as myself.

Chapter 17 — He Knew Exactly Who I Was

“Three years ago,” the attorney went on, “Dexter Ostrander discovered the truth during a quiet background check for a merger.

He found the matching DNA profile.