Chapter 4
Frank's POV
Stephanie stiffened when I asked, "You know about my other family?" She nodded but couldn't seem to form the questions I could see fleetingly cross her face. Stephanie was always an expressive child. Her thoughts could easily be read, making it simple to catch her in a lie.
"Why?" Stephanie asked. "Weren't Valerie and I good enough?"
I sighed at her question. It had nothing to do with Valerie and Stephanie. Helen was a major contributing factor in my infidelity. I can't say she's to blame, but she didn't help matters. She was frigid and only had sex until she got pregnant. Being a virile Italian man, I required more sex than what Helen could tolerate. At least that's the way she was with me. I wasn't sure if she found sex pleasurable unless she was screwing another man.
Maria was more than willing to keep up with my libido. She was extremely responsive in the bedroom, while Helen laid still until I finished. Helen wasn't in love with me. Getting what I wanted in life didn't come easy.
"You and Valerie have nothing to do with my relationship with Maria," I said, sighing. It was hard to talk about my childhood with my daughter. "I'm the youngest son of Stefano and Ginevra Plum. I have four brothers and two sisters, which you already know. We didn't have much money growing up. My parents could barely afford to put food on the table. Being the youngest, I had to wait until my parents and siblings got bathed before me. They got the first servings of food. Whatever was leftover became my meal."
"That doesn't sound fair," Stephanie said. She reached out to touch my hand. I hoped to give her some insight into my life, not incite her pity. "I know what it's like to starve, daddy."
I was surprised. "What do you mean?" I asked.
"When I was in college, I had to get a job during my third year. Mom said that you couldn't afford to pay for tuition and Valerie's wedding. She told me that I had to get a job to continue my studies or quit and find a husband to support me. I worked two shitty jobs to afford the tuition and textbook fees. There was barely enough left for food. I would eat the discarded food at the end of my shift at the diner. The owners didn't mind since it was the only meal I ate that week," Stephanie explained.
"Is that why your GPA slipped?" I asked. Stephanie nodded.
I was livid. Helen said her parents gave her money to pay the extra expenses for Valerie's wedding. I had no idea that she took the money from Stephanie to afford that monstrosity of an event. The dresses Helen chose for the bridesmaids were frilly and pink, contrasting Stephanie's skin tone. Valerie's dress had too many ruffles and puffiness to make her resemble a white whale, not that I would ever say that to my daughter.
"It's fine, daddy. Mom likes Saint Valerie more than me," Stephanie said. My lip twitched when she called her sister "Saint Valerie," which I knew was far from the truth. Helen moved the wedding up several months to make it seem that Valerie got pregnant on her wedding night. Valerie and Steve moved to California after their honeymoon. It was easy to misguide the Burg regarding Angie's birth. Helen said Valerie gave birth two months early. I couldn't believe the Burg accepted that lie as the truth.
"You need to know the rest of my story. When I joined the Army at eighteen, I was involved with another woman, Valentina Scarpetto. She was a beautiful Italian woman, and I thought I was in love. After basic training and my first tour in Vietnam, I came home to find her married with a young son. She had moved a few months before I returned. Her son, Vince, was one. I wondered if he was my son, but she insisted Vince belonged to her husband. Back then, there was no way to prove paternity. We didn't have the means for DNA or paternity tests. I had to take her word for it," I explained.
I paused when the waitress returned to place our subs on the table. They were delicious but not as good as Pino's. However, we couldn't have this conversation in our favourite restaurant without the Burg learning the details. Shorty's was noisy enough to prevent the other patrons from overhearing your conversation. "Are you looking for him?" Stephanie asked.
"No. I'm going to let sleeping dogs lie. I met Helen several months later. She was distraught after learning her boyfriend married another woman he impregnated. I felt sorry for Helen. Losing a loved one to another was difficult to handle. We met several times over the following six months before I got called back into service. I proposed before shipping out. She readily accepted. Helen said she'd plan our wedding for when I returned in nine months," I said before pausing to take a few bites of my sub.
Stephanie swallowed the food in her mouth and asked, "Was mom pregnant before your second tour?"
I shook my head. "We took time getting to know each other without complicating our emotions and relationship with sex. As far as I knew, your mother was a virgin before we married," I honestly replied. I could tell Stephanie didn't like hearing my answer.
She didn't surprise me by saying, "Daddy, that was more than I needed to know." Stephanie mumbled something about virgins and sex with her mom as her body shuddered. I was expecting her to change the subject.
"Sorry, Pumpkin. I didn't mean to make you feel uncomfortable."
"It's okay, daddy." She squirmed before setting her sub on the plate beside her. After looking around the restaurant, Stephanie leaned forward to whisper, "Is Valerie your daughter?"
I tilted my head back to laugh. "Pumpkin, we have the same colour of eyes. Both of you girls are mine," I said, pulling a piece of paper from my pocket.
"Daddy, I already know I'm your daughter. Otherwise, my sample wouldn't have matched that other one," she said, touching my hand.
"You're right. Anyway, you should read this. It proves that Valerie is mine," I said. Stephanie reluctantly accepted the document to read. In the black text, the words, "I'm pleased to inform you that both Valerie and Stephanie Plum are your biological daughters." Stephanie gasped when she read the date. I ran the tests when Helen went to an out of town funeral for her grandmother. Stephanie must have noticed the date was after the Tasty Pasty incident.
"Why?" Stephanie asked. I knew what she wanted to know.
"Your mother was having an affair with Anthony Morelli, her high school boyfriend. She never got over her first love. I wanted to know you were my daughter since you didn't look like me. It didn't take much to get the test done for Valerie," I replied. I felt raw sharing my life with Stephanie, but I knew she would eventually uncover this information without hearing my side of the story. She was always one to dig into a mystery. I needed her to know the truth.
Stephanie's face screwed up as though thinking about every encounter she had with the youngest Morelli boy. I knew about the garage and Tasty Pastry incident. Helen's reaction encouraged me to get the paternity tests when they became available. I was relieved that my daughters were mine. Raising that asshole's children would have angered me beyond anything I had experienced in Vietnam.
Stephanie's POV
Oh my god! I could have been Joseph Morelli's half-sister? What the heck was mom thinking? How could she do this to us? How could she betray daddy? "Um, dad," I started to ask but found it difficult to finish my question.
"I married your mother when I returned from my tour. We got married, and she got pregnant within a month. When I told my best friend, your uncle Joe, he told me about her indiscretions while I was away. Needless to say, I was hurt, angry and betrayed. It doesn't excuse my behaviour, but it explains why I felt no guilt regarding Maria," Dad attempted to explain.
"Turn about is fair play," I mumbled.
"Maria and I… we didn't have… um… relations until six weeks before your mother announced she was pregnant with you. By then, I had already met Maria when I visited a friend in Newark. I planned to divorce your mother, but I couldn't when I discovered the pregnancy. We used protection, but she obviously did something to render them ineffective," dad said. "I didn't want to catch whatever Morelli was spreading."
I did not need to know this. "She poked holes in them," I distractedly said.
"Maria must have done the same thing. When your mother went into labour, Maria announced she was pregnant. I proposed, not knowing what else I could do to keep my child in my life. Maria was the perfect woman, so I thought," dad sadly stated. "I was angry that we had three more children together. We always used protection, so I assumed the contraceptives were defective."
"Dad, why didn't you get a vasectomy?" I asked.
"Your mother and I weren't having sex. How would I have explained it to her?" dad replied. "Maria left me after you broke your arm. I said I had medical expenses to pay for you, and she mistakenly interpreted it as cutting off financial support. Maria knew about Helen, Valerie and you, but she was willing to wait for me. One week after your accident, I met with a lawyer to file for divorce. Before I served Helen the papers, I went to meet Maria to tell her the news. I thought she was waiting for me, but she didn't."
"What do you mean, daddy?" I asked. Lester said that dad was the one to break Maria's heart. He was the one to leave the relationship and terminate financial support. I was confused. Who was telling the truth? I reached out to touch his hand again. We had finished eating our subs, despite our unsavoury discussion.
"Yesterday, I discovered Maria never gave my children the names I chose. The original birth certificates had the names I rejected. She went behind my back to name them as she wished. I also learned her name was not Maria Lopez, as she told me when we met. Her name was Maria Santos. From the first day we met, she had lied to me," dad quietly said. I could see the hurt on his face.
"Daddy," I gently said. I waited for him to look into my eyes. "Lester said they grew up in a rough part of Newark. His sisters were trained to give fake names to boys for self protection. There were a lot of gang activity, and maintaining some semblance of anonymity protected Maria and her family. You can't hate her for doing what she was taught."
"I had no idea," dad said. "But it doesn't explain why she didn't name the children as I anticipated or tell me her real name during our nine year relationship." He pulled more papers from his pocket. When he laid them out, I saw copies of birth certificates with the names and birthdates of his four children. Lester's name wasn't on his paperwork. Dad pointed to the papers and explained, "Pedro Mateo Lopez is Lester Basil Santos. Seraphina Celine Lopez is Luisa Rose Santos. Annabella Lucia Lopez is Elena Violet Santos, and Isabel Maria Lopez is Juanita Iris Santos. She changed all of their names. These are the original certificates."
"I'm not an expert, daddy, but those documents are fake," I said. "They don't have the watermarks." I lifted a page to tilt, showing him the difference in the papers. "New Jersey started using watermarks on the birth certificates the year Valerie was born. My history teacher showed us the different marks used in each state."
"I didn't know. Your mother always handled such things," dad said.
"I'm sorry that I don't have another explanation for you. When Lester visits Trenton, you two should talk. Maybe he can give you more insight into Maria's mind," I suggested.
"I don't think it's a good idea. I've caused enough problems for my son. Delving into the madness inside his mother's mind won't make things better between us. It's best to leave the past alone. Nobody will benefit from dragging the dirty laundry of our past into the present," dad said. "I'm sorry for not telling you sooner."
"That's fine, daddy. I'm sorry for not saying something when I made the connection," I replied. I pulled the dog tags from around my neck and passed them to my dad.
He shook his head and pushed my hand back toward me. "Keep them. They helped you find your family." Dad left me standing in Shorty's with my jaw resting on my chest. He had dropped money on the table to cover our bill.
After slipping the chain back over my head, I left the restaurant to figure out how to share the news with Valerie and Lester. I thought the discussion with dad went well, but I couldn't shake the hurt over everything dad had lost.
I drove home in complete silence, which was unusual for me. Dad shared his heartbreaking stories with me. First, he was an afterthought as a child. It was a feeling I understood since mom made me feel the same way. Then, daddy fell in love before his Army training and returned to heartbreak. He finds another woman to love, gets married and has a child. Only to learn she was anything but faithful to him. The betrayal from his last love was worse than the other two women combined. It's no wonder dad looked and acted like a beaten dog. He suffered many hard knocks in life. What Dickie had done to me was nothing compared to everything dad experienced.
When I calmed my nerves, I picked up the landline phone to call Valerie. "Hello," Valerie cheerfully answered.
"Are you always so chipper?" I groaned.
Valerie laughed. "Of course, Steph. So? How did it go?" she asked, getting to the point.
"I don't think we should confront Maria," I said. She patiently waited until I finished the story.
"That bitch. I'm not going to let her get away with this," Valerie stated.
"Me neither, but I don't want Lester to get hurt in the crossfire. Les and our sisters are innocent, Val," I said.
"It's too bad you didn't get a recording of your talk with daddy. We could use that to prove our story," she said. It wasn't a bad idea. I knew Shorty had cameras inside his restaurant, but I didn't think he recorded the patrons while they dined.
I grabbed my phone to contact my buddy. He helped me during my computer courses at Douglass College. He was around three years younger than me, but was smarter than the professor. "I'll check with my friend," I told Valerie. "If Shorty has video evidence, my friend will find it."
"You shouldn't associate yourself with the gang, Steph. It would only lead to trouble," Valerie admonished. I rolled my eyes because my friend left the gang several years ago. He worked for a local computer programming company, creating firewall programs to prevent hackers from accessing client databases. I didn't understand the terminology, but Hector said it was to stop people from collecting information from your computer without your knowledge.
"It's fine, Val. He's harmless and doesn't belong to a gang," I said. Hector used to belong to a gang, but his friend, Ricardo, helped him get out, then sent him to college to get his degree in computer programming. Ricardo paid the school fees. I could have used a friend like Ricardo.
"I can meet you in Miami a week from today. Steve gifted me a plane ticket for my birthday," Valerie stated. "The girls would be on spring break and Steve has the week off."
"Okay. Text me your flight number, and I'll meet you near the baggage claim," I said before hanging up. I guess we're doing this.
Hector messaged that Shorty records everything in his restaurant in case the patrons get into a fight. He promised to get the video of my conversation with my dad. I thanked my friend and explained that Valerie and I were confronting Maria Santos in Florida the following week. Hector, my amazing friend, sent me her address and purchased an airline ticket for me.
"Hola," Hector answered.
"Thank you. I'll pay you back for the ticket," I said.
"No. It's my gift to you. Stay safe and call me when you land," Hector said. "I rented a car and hotel too."
"Okay." I ended the call and wiped the tears from my face. Hector might look scary with the teardrop tattoo below his left eye, but deep inside, he had a heart of gold.
