'What is it?' she asked again, a nervously fluttering hand coming up to her throat. She watched, her nerves stretching, as the girl visibly battled for composure.
'I. . .I'm not sure how you're going to take this news,' Gemma said haltingly.
'What news?'
'Oh, God .. .I can't .. .I just can't. You ... you'd better read this.'
And she came forward to place a large brown envelope on her desk. 'You'd better sit down.'
Celeste blinked. Sit down? Good God, what was in this envelope?
But she did as she was told, sat down and drew out several pages of what looked like a typed report. From the moment she saw the faded photograph attached, her stomach clenched down hard.
Celeste read each page with a fearful, yet excited anticipation welling up within her. This couldn't be true, she kept saying to herself. And yet it was. It was!
Her eyes flew up, locking with Gemma's suddenly tearful ones.
'You are my mother, aren't you?' the girl said, hopefully, pleadingly.
Celeste choked up totally, her head swimming as the force of emotion hit. All she could was a weak nod.
Then Gemma smiled and Celeste's heart burst open, all the pain of the past years obliterated by that one beautifully loving gesture.
'Mother,' Gemma said softly, and held out her arms. With a strangled sob Celeste ran to her daughter, falling into her arms in an embrace that held all the unused love in her heart. 'Oh, my darling child,' she wept. 'My daughter. Oh, God, I don't believe it. . .'
'Believe it, Mother. Believe it.'
Celeste pulled back, stunned by the composure of this lovely girl who was her own beautiful little baby grown up. Her shaking hand reached out to trace over her hair and face. 'I. .. thought you were lost to me forever,' she said shakily. 'You were stolen from me, you know, like the detective suggested might have happened in that report. I didn't give you away, I promise you. And I did try to find you. Not with any success, unfortunately. I thought. . .I ... I. . .'
The tears took over again and she could not go on. Gemma pulled her back into a bear-hug. 'I knew that if you were alive somewhere,' she said firmly, 'one day, I would find you.'
Mother and daughter hugged for a while till Celeste drew back with a still bewildered look on her face. 'I still can't believe it. You don't understand what this means to me. You could never understand.'
You are my only child, came the wrenchingly emotional thought. The only child I will ever have. But it didn't seem the right moment to say that.
'You're so beautiful,' she said, once again tracin g trembling fingers over her daughter's sweet face.
Gemma smiled that heart-stopping sweet smile of hers, making Celeste go to mush once more.
'I must take after my mother,' she said generously. Celeste's groan was tortured.
'Are you sure you want someone like me as your mot her?'
'I'm proud to have you as my mother,' Gemma insisted warmly.
'But ... but what about my reputation?'
'Are you talking about the lovers you've had? Why should you be judged so harshly for that? You're not married and you're still a very beautiful woman. You have every right to be loved.'
'But. .. but. . .'
'Do you think I'm shocked because you've had relationships with younger men? Why should I be? Nathan is many years older than I am. Age has nothing to do with love.'
'Would you believe me if I told you none of those young men was my lover?'
There was no doubting Gemma was startled. But she quickly gathered herself to speak in a reassuringly firm voice.
'Of course I would believe you! Why would you lie? But my love isn't conditional on such things. You're my mother! I love you as I've always loved you, even without knowing you. And now that I know you didn't deliberately leave me with my father, I don't even feel angry with you any more.'
Celeste was jolted by this. She hadn't yet thought of what Gemma's life had been like with that ghastly man. Oh, the poor darling, the poor, poor darling ...
Her expression was anguished as she reached out to her daughter again, though it was so good to just touch her, to gaze into her lovely eyes while she stroked her lovely hair. 'He didn't. .. mistreat you, did he? I don't think I could bear that. .. '
'He tried to be a good father,' Gemma said. 'I think he loved me, but he was a hard man to live with.'
'How ... how did he die?'
'Fell down a mine shaft. Or was pushed. I. . .I've always felt guilty that I wasn't able to grieve for him as a daughter should. To be honest, he and I never saw eye to eye. Ma says we weren't at all alike.'