“What is?”

He looked almost sorry. Almost. “The surprise is why your mother believed your father had no legal right to make decisions for you.”

The room fell silent. Outside, a gull cried above the harbor. My father gripped the desk as if it were the only solid thing left in the world. I stared at the man who had raised me, searching his face for an explanation.

He looked back with tears in his eyes.

And for the first time in my life, I wondered whether Charles Bennett was my father at all.

End of Part One.