be a nun. I went in for shaky reasons, after a broken engagement, when I got jilted at the altar. That isn’t good enough to last for an entire life.” Hattie knew why she had gone into the convent, and she hoped the reason was good enough to carry her all the way. There was no question, what she had learned about Saint Blaise’s had shaken her respect for some of the decisions that people in the Church made, but not her faith. She had sought the convent as a refuge and safe haven, and it still was for her.
She thanked Fiona again for the invaluable information that had led to Michaela, and hung up thinking about what the ex-nun had said. Hattie could only conclude that Fiona’s vocation had been fragile, and not strong enough to withstand all that she’d seen at Saint Blaise’s, and her role in it. Hattie had no part in that. There was no blood on her hands. She had only been a child when it was happening. But Fiona’s words kept echoing in her head…a vocation is a delicate thing…like spun glass…and in her heart of hearts, Hattie knew just how true it was.
Chapter 7
Both Michaela and Hattie had the mouth swab for the DNA kits the next day. Michaela went to her doctor, and Hattie to a lab at UCLA and made the request. Melissa would have one too eventually, which would be conclusive, but this would give them some significant idea if they were related, and on the right track. Hattie didn’t want to give Melissa false hope and then break her heart again.
She went to Michaela’s house for dinner that night, and met her husband and their children, Andrew and Alexandra. David Foster was a handsome man in his late thirties, with dark eyes, dark hair, a cleft chin, and looked like a movie star. Michaela said he had done some acting and modeling before he went to law school and became an entertainment lawyer. He worked for a prestigious firm. He seemed to be very much in love with Michaela, and was great to his kids.
The children, Andrew and Alexandra, were adorable, and very well behaved. They were six and four, and all together they looked like the poster for the perfect family. Michaela had dark hair like Melissa, and had the same tall, lean build. Her features were more like her grandmother’s, but when she moved, Hattie was instantly reminded of Melissa. She found it hard now to believe they weren’t related. It seemed so obvious to her.
The children loved playing with Hattie before and after dinner, and she was falling in love with the idea that she might be their great-aunt, although she felt a little young for that. Hattie was only ten years older than Michaela, since Melissa was so young when she had her.
Michaela had explained everything to David the night before. He knew of his wife’s attempts to find her birth mother, and it seemed right to him that somehow they had found each other, if indeed Hattie was correct and she had miraculously found Melissa’s long-lost baby girl. Hattie thought about them the next day all the way back to New York. She and Michaela had agreed that Hattie would not say anything to Melissa until they got the DNA results back. And Michaela was waiting to tell her adoptive mother too. She was on location anyway, and wouldn’t be back in L.A. for a month. It wasn’t the kind of news Michaela wanted to tell her on the phone.
Hattie and Michaela promised to stay in touch while they waited for the test results to come in. And when Hattie wasn’t thinking of them on the plane to New York, she was thinking about everything Fiona Eckles had told her, and what she had seen of Saint Blaise’s herself. It validated everything Melissa had told her the last time they’d seen each other, when Hattie visited her at her new home.
Hattie had a deep sense of shame being associated with a church that would use people for gain, and exploit their griefs, leaving young girls forever damaged by giving up their babies in such a cruel way. It went against everything she believed about the Church, and she wanted time alone now to give it more thought.
She had been gone for barely a week, but she had seen and learned so much, in Dublin and Los Angeles. She felt like a