Part 2: Three Little Faces
My closest friend, Rachel Donovan, lived outside Charlotte, North Carolina, and when she heard what was happening, she offered me her guest bedroom without even asking how long I planned to stay.
Rachel had always been practical, the kind of woman who could make a terrifying situation feel manageable just by setting a kettle on the stove and asking what needed to happen next.
When I told her about the pregnancy, she took both my hands across her kitchen table.
“Three babies?” she whispered.
I nodded, already struggling to picture how I’d cope.
She looked at me for a long moment before smiling through tears.
“Then I guess we’d better get organized.”
Those early months were hard. I worried about money, went to appointment after appointment, and sometimes lay awake listening to the unfamiliar sounds of Rachel’s neighborhood, wondering whether I’d been foolish to think I could start over.
I didn’t tell Nathaniel about the pregnancy.
Part of me knew he deserved the truth, but another part remembered his insistence that children would get in the way of his plans, and I feared he and his powerful family would turn the pregnancy into yet another dispute for their attorneys to manage.
I told myself I’d reconsider once the babies were safely here and I’d built a stable home.
Then the months became years.
My daughters were born in November, each one healthy and wonderfully different despite their similar features.
I named them Hazel, June, and Willa.
Hazel had a determined expression that made the nurses laugh. June seemed happy to watch everything around her, while Willa protested whenever anyone disturbed her sleep.
Rachel stood by my hospital bed that first evening, gazing at the three little bundles resting nearby.
“Look at what you’ve got, Em,” she whispered. “You thought you were leaving with nothing.”
I looked at my daughters and understood that whatever difficulties lay ahead, my life was already richer than the one I’d left behind.
Over the next four years, I built a small home-renovation consulting business, first working from Rachel’s dining table and eventually opening an office with six employees.
I bought a comfortable house on a quiet street, learned to run on interrupted sleep, and discovered that three little girls could turn an ordinary Tuesday into an adventure involving spilled cereal, missing shoes, and elaborate arguments over whose stuffed rabbit was the oldest.
My business grew steadily, but I rarely talked about it outside my professional circle.
I had no wish to prove anything to Nathaniel.
I simply wanted a life where my daughters felt secure and I could make decisions without asking anyone’s permission.
By the time our plane touched down in Charlotte, Nathaniel had spent much of the flight asking questions that sounded casual but carried unmistakable curiosity about my circumstances.
He mentioned his company’s latest acquisitions, the new vacation property he’d bought, and the important people he expected to meet during his visit.
When he asked whether I’d remarried, I told him I hadn’t.
He gave a knowing smile.
“I suppose it’s difficult finding someone who understands you as well as I did.”
I nearly laughed, though I chose not to answer.
At baggage claim, he kept walking beside me, apparently assuming we were headed the same way.
Outside the terminal, the afternoon air was pleasantly warm, and I spotted Rachel standing next to a dark SUV near the passenger pickup area.
Before I could wave, the rear door swung open, and three familiar voices rose above the noise of passing cars.
“Mommy!”
Hazel reached me first, curls bouncing as she hurried across the sidewalk with Rachel close behind. June threw both arms around my waist, while Willa held up a folded piece of paper she’d apparently been carrying around all afternoon.
I knelt to pull them into my arms, laughing as they competed to tell me everything that had happened during my overnight trip.
“I missed you so much,” I told them.
“We missed you more,” Hazel insisted.
“I made you a picture,” Willa announced.
“And I learned to write a J without help,” June added proudly.
For a few precious moments, the airport, the flight, and the man standing behind me vanished from my mind.
Then I heard Nathaniel speak.
“Emily?”
Something in his voice made me turn.
He was staring at the girls with an expression I’d never once seen on his face.
“These are your children?”
“Yes,” I answered, keeping one hand on Hazel’s shoulder.
He looked from one little face to the next, taking in their matching chestnut curls and gray-green eyes.
“All three?”
I nodded.
“They’re triplets.”
His gaze came back to mine.
“How old are they?”
“Four. They’ll turn five next month.”
Nathaniel went completely still.
I watched him silently work backward through the years, recalling when our divorce had become final and when I’d left Connecticut.
Then he looked again at Hazel, whose eyes were so much like his that I’d recognized the resemblance the moment she was born.
“Emily,” he said quietly, “are they my daughters?”
