Sitting behind her desk in her Crimson office, Nina thought about her daughters, her third of the heart locket dangling between her fingers.

She had been pregnant with twins, but she hadn't known that before she slipped into a coma because of her mother. Her pregnancy hadn't been far enough along for her to know what her child's gender was, let alone that she was carrying two.

But she had been carrying two children. Two baby girls. Because of her mother, Nina had been robbed of the joy of experiencing pregnancy and had remained comatose while her daughters were stolen from her and given up for adoption.

One of her daughters was still unknown to her. Nina thought about her every day, always wondering if she took after Silas or her Aunt Liesl or if she was blonde like Nina herself or her grandmother, Madeline. She agonized over if she was happy, if she had a good family, a good life…she even wondered about her missing daughter's name. She ached inside knowing that one of her babies remained missing.

The only thing that comforted her was the fact that, while the identity of one of her daughters was a mystery, the identity of the other one was not.

Willow Tait was her daughter. The young woman she had scorned two years ago was one of those beautiful baby girls who had been torn from her womb and given to people who didn't deserve her. It infuriated her to know that she's been mistreated her entire life. If her mother had never been so greedy, if she had just let her be happy instead of trying to control everything, then her daughter would have been raised by parents who loved her and had a happy childhood. She'd have known her twin sister.

Nina couldn't forgive her mother for taking her daughters from her and making Willow suffer.

"Damn you, Mother," Nina murmured, tears of anger and grief pooling in her eyes as her fingers tightened around the broken heart. It was poetic, she mused, that her mother chose to cut a heart necklace into three parts, one for Nina and two for her grandchildren. It was fitting, in a twisted sense, that Madeline broke a piece of jewelry just as she had broken the family Nina made with Silas.

Willow, her little girl who reminded her so much of her father and her Aunt Liesl, didn't even know that she had been adopted. There was a bond between them now, and Nina could see it in Willow's eyes that she felt their connection just as much as Nina herself did. There was a chance that, subconsciously, Willow recognized her as her mother, that she's been receptive to their newfound friendship because somewhere, on a primal level, she knew who they really were to each other.

Realistically, though, Nina knew that consciously, Willow knew nothing about her adoption or that she was her biological mother. Realistically, Willow still believed that Douglas and Lorraine (Nina felt the same rage towards Harmony that she felt towards her mother just by thinking the woman's name) Miller were her parents and that Nina was just a good friend who had had a change of heart from her previous dislike of her. There's no way that Willow would suspect anything less than what she's known her entire life.

Still, Nina couldn't help but hope…

Sighing heavily, Nina leaned forward in her chair, bringing her hands together and resting her forehead against them, her necklace hanging like a rosary during prayer.

"I need to tell her," she whispered into the silence of the room. "I need to tell Willow she's my daughter, but how?"

She couldn't spring it on her, especially when she was still so emotionally vulnerable, but Nina didn't think she could contain the truth any longer, not when that bitch Nelle was free and making her daughter miserable just by walking around town. She was tired of just watching from the sidelines as a friend. She wanted to be up close. She wanted to be her mother.

"Maybe if I visit her at Chase's apartment," Nina murmured. "Have us sit down and talk."

But would her boyfriend's apartment really be the best place to have that discussion? It would be better than, say, the Metro Court or Kelly's, but given that Willow had been assaulted in Chase's apartment, Nina wasn't sure it would be wise to possibly bring another uncomfortable situation into it.

'Better there than you being a coward and not telling her at all.'

"Not you again," Nina muttered, irritation lacing her voice as the side of her she labeled as Vindictive Nina, the part of her that manipulated everyone when she awoke from her coma and wanted nothing but to cause chaos, reared her ugly head again.

'Yes, me again,' Vindictive Nina smugly replied. 'Did you miss me?'

"Oh yes," Nina said sarcastically. "I've missed you just like I miss being in a coma for over twenty years."

Vindictive Nina chuckled. 'You know you need to tell Willow the truth. She could find out some other way and then you'd run the risk of your only known daughter hating you.'

"Shut up."

'You know I'm right.'

"I said shut up!" Nina snapped, her voice rising an octave.

'Take it easy,' Vindictive Nina warned gleefully. 'If your employees start hearing their boss talk to herself, they're going to think that you've gone crazy…again.'

Nina took in a deep breath, bringing the fist still clasping her necklace up to her forehead, closing her eyes in a desperate attempt to calm her nerves. Slowly exhaling the breath, she acknowledged that Vindictive Nina was right for once.

Willow deserved to know the truth about her parentage, and she didn't want anyone else to tell her.

"I'll go to Chase's apartment and tell her. To hell with Crimson," Nina said, her eyes hard with steely determination.

'That's the spirit!'

Nina ignored the other side of her and focused on Willow. She wouldn't let anyone or anything stop her. She would tell Willow everything.

"Mommy's coming, Willow."