I don't know where to start, or what all should I cover, because there is so much. I feel like I'm going behind my mother because this is her story, not mine. But it impacts me too, it has impacted my entire life till this day.

"Do you need anything?" He asks and I shake my head, setting back in the bed a little with his hand still in mine.

"He was Mom's high school boyfriend." I start, swallowing as I meet his eyes. I have his full attention. He has removed his shoes, and he's sitting in front of me with his legs folded in Indian style. "They had been dating a few months, and they both got a little drunk at a party he threw. He was a bad influence on her, from the beginning but she didn't realise how much until that night."

"What happened?" He asks and I grimace at the thought.

I try to keep back the bile that rises with that thought and the one that follows after it. "Mom got pregnant that night."

"With you." He whispers and I nod, trying not to cry because I'm so sick of crying. "What went wrong?"

"He didn't have her consent, Blake." I try to put it in as simple terms as possible without wanting to repeat the exact words of what I found out.

"What?" His lips part, his hold on my hand tightening as he processes the words.

"Yeah." I close my eyes to swallow down the pain.

"Is that why he's in jail?" He asks, because things were that simple when it came to Nathaniel Miller.

I shake my head before nodding. "There's more."

"Anytime you want to stop, that's okay with me." He assures me. I give him a small smile for being so patient with me.

"He refused to accept that Mom was pregnant, or that he was the father. To make it worse, Granpa didn't take the news of Mom's pregnancy well, didn't listen to her when she tried to convey that she was basically raped. He threw her out of the house—"

"Seriously?" He looks shocked, and I was too, when I got to know. It has taken me a long time to forgive so many people in my life for their actions in the past.

I nod feebly. "It's in the past."

"I'm sorry." He looks sincere. "I don't want to sound judgmental but it's just unexpected, seeing how close you all are."

"I know." I look at him, shrugging. "That's why it's in the past."

He nods, "Go on."

"Gramps got her to New York, where I was born. She stayed with him until after her pregnancy but there's something else." My voice breaks a little and his hand comes around my cheek as his thumb grazes my skin.

"What is it?"

"I had a twin brother." I blink back the tears, because this is something I've had years to make my peace with. "He was still born."

He doesn't say anything, he just pulls me closer and I let him. I crawl in his lap, taking in his scent to calm my nerves.

"I am grateful to the family I have, but I think about Evan, if it would be different if he was here." I explain. "Evan's the name Mom decided on. Evan and Emily, like Odion and Ohana."

When I see the two of them getting along like they do, like they have some telepathy powers, that's when I think about the loss. I wonder about it the most when things related to my father go haywire, like today. If he was here, he would've helped me understand if the decision I made was correct or wrong, because he would have to make the same one.

"His grave's in New York," I tell him. "I visit sometimes, not as much as I'd like because it feels surreal. We never met, but we shared a womb, you know?"

His fingers come around to wipe the few tears I hadn't realised were there. He kisses my hair, "I can't even imagine what that must feel like."

I am grateful for his warmth, for his comfort as I hold onto him like my life depends on it. I feel too vulnerable when it comes to Blake, and we have so much to talk about but he has chosen to keep that aside when I need him, like always. He always puts my needs first, even above our relationship.

"It was weird when I first got to know, like I was grieving the loss of something I never had." I try to explain, meeting his eyes and he nods at me. "But it's better now. He's resting peacefully."

"I'm sure he is." He gives me a sad smile, making me sigh.

"So, I grew up in New York. Without my father because he basically insulted her when she announced the pregnancy. I think my first best friends were your parents." I smile at the memory and he looks surprised.

"Really?"

"Yeah." I laugh a little. "Ella was the first person I met apart from Gramps and Gram, and later Connor. They were both there for me so much, it's like I had my own small happy family with just five people."

"Suddenly their love for you makes a lot of sense." He mumbles and I kiss his jaw. "I'm sorry I ever said anything about envying you."

I smile at him, shaking my head. "It's okay, I would lose my shit if I was in your shoes too."

"Still. If I had just known—"

"You didn't, and that's okay. We're all good, right?" I ask and he nods, sighing. "Yes, so eventually my parents met. They fell in love, that's their own story of how Mom forgave her parents. But Nate again came into the picture."

"How?" He asks, sounding a little confused.

"Mom went back to Larkspur because of Granny's health, and he showed up. He thought she had gotten an abortion, but viola, there I was." I scoff, shaking my head at how pathetic my life is. "He begged to meet me, and I often used to cry and throw tantrums about wanting to meet my father, from what my mother tells me. Now that I think about it, I was such a heteronormative child. Imagine if I had two Moms."

Blake laughs amusedly, but his smile doesn't really reach his eyes. "You're so random, you know that?"

I nod, smiling as I sit up in his lap a little. "Anyway, I met Nate. I remember it vaguely, to be honest. A lot of the memories of back then are blurry but I can imagine myself being the happiest after meeting him."

"Makes sense." Blake mumbles. "What went wrong?"

I sigh. "He promised to stay in contact when we came back to New York. He wanted to get more involved in my life but Mom and Dad both were hesitant, for the right reasons. She didn't trust him but then I started asking for him more so she let me be with him on two days a month."

I think about my memories from back then, how happy I used to be every time the weekend where he had to pick me up approached. It was my own little holiday of the month where I got to spend time with my father, and I had fun. He used to spoil me with candies and gifts.

"That continued, and Dad's role in my life started to grow. He had been living with us for three years and he had been more of a father to me than Nate himself who started to slack on the weekends. He started making excuses for not showing up and Dad always, always took me out every time Nate didn't show up. When my parents got married, Dad asked to adopt me, and I was just six years old."

"That young?" He asks and I nod.

"Mom let me make the decision and I agreed in a heartbeat, Blake. You know the first time I met him, I asked him if he was my father and he never answered, because he didn't know it back then, but he was. He is my father." My voice cracks a little as I recall the memory. "He needed Nate's written consent, since he was the biological father, very much alive, and in contact with me, however occasional."

"That couldn't have been pretty." Blake frowns and I sigh.

"It wasn't difficult either. He agreed to let him adopt me, and I remember how happy I was. I started calling him Dad, and the first time I said it, he cried." I smile at the memory, Blake's face mirroring my expression.

"He's a good man," He says and I nod in agreement.

"The best. I'm so damn lucky to have him. All of us are." I shrug a little. I'm doing awfully well talking about this without breaking into sobs so far. "But I still looked forward to meeting Nate. I always felt like I was too lucky to have two Dads so I tried to reason it out that my life can't give me too much. So whatever little three of four visits I got from him in a year, I made my peace with it."

"Every time you talk about him, I start to hate him more." He grumbles.

"I haven't even reached the real reason I hate him." I clear my throat. "I was a growing kid and desperate for his attention so I took up basketball because I knew he used to play it in high school. He used to teach me on those weekends and had given me his jersey. Mom had also talked about it on rare occasions I forced her to tell me about him. I didn't know the reality back then, I didn't know he had, you know, forced himself on her. I feel so foolish looking back, asking her to remember things."

"Hey, it isn't your fault. You didn't know." He assures me the same thing my mother always tells me. I try not to grimace at the memory.

"Still." I tug my hair behind my ear. "For a year straight he didn't show up, and I was approaching fourteen by then. I understood things better than I would like to admit. For months, I tried to reach out to him through mail, different numbers, something only to meet a dead end."

"What happened?" He asks, his voice a little anxious and on the edge.

"He didn't show up, but police did. Mom was pregnant with the twins and Caiden was out to play with his friends." I recall the horrible memory.

"What did he do?" Blake's eyes are a little wide and I know he's thinking the worst possible thing right now.

"They weren't there for him. They came to arrest Dad." I whisper, avoiding his eyes because of how ashamed I feel.

"Aaron?" He scowls and I nod, swallowing the guilt. "Why?"

"Nate had filed a court case against him for false consent of my adoption." I mumble out the words that keep me awake at night.

"What?" He sounds shocked, to say the least.

"He bullshitted everyone, got a lawyer, made a false case against Dad. Dad spent the night in the jail while my poor pregnant mother spent the night calling everyone she could to bail him out. No one told Caiden and I anything, I just remember Ella picking us up while Connor stayed back. But I knew something was wrong, I had just seen my father getting arrested, and Blake, so much was at risk. He was running an entire company by then, and the stocks could drop overnight with one bad news." I try to explain everything I didn't really understand back then, or wasn't even aware about.

"You should've let me punch him." He breathes, his jaw twitching with anger. "Even after that, he has the guts to ask for your forgiveness?"

I shrug, letting my breathing turn to normal as I recall the events from what my mother has told me. "Granpa flew down to the city and got him an overnight bail with his contacts. Gramps helped to keep the entire thing off the news."

"But why did he do that, why did he make a false case?" Blake sounds confused, as was I.

"A year before all this he asked my mother for half custody, and she straight out refused. They had a huge fight and he didn't take it well. So, for a year he disappeared to plan all this, to make it seem that my parents were unfit for my custody and that he should have my sole responsibility." I scoff, shaking my head.

"What the actual fuck." Blake gapes in surprise. "No offence, Emma, but he sounds like a psychopath. What kind of person does that? He barely saw you, and he wanted the custody?"

Exactly. I wish he had just made good use of the access he had to me instead of going all vindictive with his agenda against my mother. He ruined her life so much, his and mine alongside.

"Yeah. He's crazy." I shake my head, my heart hurting as I recall everything. "Eventually I had to force everything out of my mother because I couldn't take it anymore, so she sat me down and told me everything. Well, everything apart from how I was really conceived."

"And?"

"And, I remember crying in front of Dad so much. He was going through everything just because of me, I still feel guilty. If he hadn't adopted me, none of this would've happened." I feel the tears finally stinging my eyes. "He just told me that he loves me and I have nothing to worry about, that's it. That's all he told me, no harsh words, no glares. He told me to focus on school and to leave all this to the adults."

"But you didn't, did you?" He asks and I smile, shaking my head.

"They were fighting the case already, and he had strong lawyers too. I used to eavesdrop on my parents's conversation a lot because Mom never told me everything. But one night I heard them fighting because of it, and it was a silly fight but they barely ever argued. So, I tried to reach out to Nate, at least to understand why he was doing all this but he just said not to worry, that I'll soon be with him. That's when I told him that I didn't want to be with him, that if he really loved me, he would leave me and my family alone."

"Did he?" He asks, and I nod.

"He plead guilty a month before twins were born." I sigh. "I don't know what happened, but looking back, he was losing the case already. My mother had finally pressed charges against the sexual assault she had suffered from him. She said that he didn't expect for her to bring that up, and she had people testifying against him, including his own father who was ashamed of his son."

"Fuck." Blake shakes his head. "This is too much. I have a new found respect for your mother, for you, for your Dad. Caiden doesn't know, does he?"

I sigh, "He found out I'm their half-sister on his birthday, so I told the twins as well, but nothing else. Like you said, it's too much."

"How did you find out about the sexual assault?" He asks and I take his palm, tracing my finger on it to distract myself from the memory.

"I was looking for some documents in the house when I found the case file." I mumble. "I read it, and I was crying in my room when Dad found me. He let Mom explain. It was some time back this year, before I left for Chicago."

"Is that why you left?"

I nod, "It was the last straw, I couldn't handle it."

"You're here right now, Emma. You're still handling it, and I don't think I've ever seen anyone more strong." He whispers, resting his forehead against mine.

"Have you met my mom?" I smile a little. "She's the strongest person I know."

"Like mother, like daughter." He wipes my unshed tears, his eyes searching for mine. "When was the last time you met him?"

"After I turned eighteen, I visited him once. I already hated him for what he had done to Dad, that was enough for me to stop from ever visiting him. But I felt like I owed it to myself to visit him once, so I did. It was unexpected, his father was visiting him too and you can only have one visitor in a day so Michael, his father let me meet him."

"He testified against his own son, and yet visited him?"

"He's the only son he has, however fucked up he is." I shrug, because that's only way I can look at it. "I looked at him and I felt like I was staring at a stranger, someone I dearly loved but couldn't love. So, I decided to never see him again."

It was the right decision. After seeing him today, I have absolutely no regrets about it. My anger that had been buried down for years seems to be humming right now as I recall every wrong step he took.

Blake's gaze on me is intense and I know it's a lot to process, so I give him time. I don't force him to speak to me when he stays quiet for the next five minutes.

I feel guilty even as I recall everything. I owe a lot to my parents, my entire life actually but Dad has never once made me feel that way. He has never once made me feel like he had to go through so many hardships because of me, he has just accepted it as part of life's downs. He's too kind for the world.

"You have his eyes." Blake finally speaks up, catching my attention as I look up. "The first night we spent together, I complimented your eyes, and you said you hate them."

I shrug, "I do. It's a constant reminder of him."

"He might be your biological father, Emma. But you're nothing like him," He speaks up, targeting my darkest thoughts. I wonder how he does that. "And you have nothing to feel guilty about, none of this was your mistake."

"If it weren't for me, Dad wouldn't have—"

"Has he ever blamed you?" He asks and I shake my head. "Because you aren't responsible, baby. Nate is. You don't have to carry the guilt of his mistakes on your shoulders."

Those are the words I whisper to myself on nights I can't sleep. I've never told anyone about any of this, and I barely ever talk about this with my mother because I don't want to worry her. But to hear the person I love say those words to me, it makes me want to cross a boundary.

"Thank you, for saying that." I smile at him. "You made me get through that night."

"When?"

"The night Dad got arrested. I was so upset, and I wasn't eating. I didn't even know that it was related to Nate till then. You asked me what was wrong, I couldn't tell you so I just snapped and Ella couldn't get through me either. But then you offered that I could do your make-up."

"Oh my god." His eyes widen. "That night?"

I laugh, nodding. "You have always been so beautiful."

"Shit." He smiles embarrassingly. "I think Mom still has those photographs somewhere."

"I do too." I grin, getting off his lap. He gives me a quizzical look as I pull out the box I kept underneath my bed the night of the party.

I keep it on the bed and pull out a stack of photos. The first one, the one Myra asked about that night, I show it to him.

"You remember this?" I ask and he smiles, nodding.

"We went to Florida."

"Yeah." I smile, rummaging through at least twenty different photos before finding the one where I did Blake's make-up.

I was a teenager and a ten-year old boy was offering himself for a makeover when I was upset. I jumped at the chance, thinking it would distract me and it did. Now that I look back, even when we were kids, Blake became my escape in his own way.

He has always been there for me. Always.

"Here."

I show him the photo and he laughs, his dimples digging deep in his cheeks as he looks at us. I was standing proudly by his side while he was grinning through the lipstick he was wearing.

"Blake?" I clear my throat, my heart almost in my mouth as he looks up, a small smile lingering on his lips.

"Yeah?"

"I love you."

His smile drops almost instantly, and I want to take it back, but at the same time I want him to know how I feel. I have never said those words romantically to anyone before, but I have no regrets about loving him.

"What?" His voice is almost inaudible.

"I love you." I repeat, making sure he heard me correctly. "I am in love with you, I have been in love with you. It has taken me some time to figure it out, but I am. We still have a lot to talk about, but—"

He doesn't let me finish, he knocks aside the box before closing the distance between us. When his lips meet mine, I can breathe again. It's not rushed, it's not slow either, it's nearly perfect.

His lips mould against mine, he brings his hand up to hold my face as we try to get enough of each other. I didn't expect for him to say it back, but this is more than satisfactory response I could've asked for. A part of me was afraid he would laugh in my face but with my hand on his chest, the way his heart is beating — I know we would be more than okay.

We part away a little to catch our breath. He rests his forehead against mine, his breath fanning over my lips.

"Can you say it again?" He asks, like he's finding it hard to believe.

"I love you, Blake." I repeat, and I would repeat it as many times as he would want me to.

"God, Emma." He closes his eyes, a breath of relief leaving him before he opens them again. There are a thousand of different emotions reflecting through his eyes and I swallow at how vulnerable he looks. "I love you."