She was wearing a loose maternity shirt under her green apron, and she was barely showing.

But the gesture was completely instinctive.

She was protecting her unborn child.

My chest turned cold.

I felt the air leave my lungs.

She was pregnant.

And my husband was secretly giving her hundreds of dollars in cash.

I looked at Dave, my eyes burning with tears.

“Are you the father?” I whispered, the words tasting like poison in my mouth.

Dave stood up so fast his water glass rattled against the table.

His face was completely pale, and he looked like he was about to vomit.

“Clara, my god, no,” he said, his voice loud enough to make the cook look out from the kitchen window.

“No. We need to talk. Outside. Right now.”

He grabbed my arm, his grip firm but gentle, and pulled me out of the booth.

Maya stood there by the table, her hand still pressed against her stomach, tears starting to spill over her eyelashes.

Dave didn’t wait for me to agree.

He practically marched me out of the diner and into the gravel parking lot.

The cold Ohio rain was falling, soaking my hair and my jacket, but I didn’t care.

I pulled my arm away from him and turned around, ready to scream.

“How could you do this to me?” I sobbed, the rain mixing with my tears.

“We have been married for twenty-eight years, Dave!”

“Clara, shut up for one second and listen to me,” he said, his voice cracking with an emotion I had never heard from him before.

He was crying.

Dave, who hadn’t cried since his father died fifteen years ago, was sobbing.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out his faded leather wallet, his hands shaking so badly he could barely hold it.

He opened the wallet and pulled out a small, folded piece of paper from behind his driver’s license.

He handed it to me.

I didn’t want to take it, but my fingers reached out anyway.

I unfolded the paper.

It was a copy of an old birth certificate from a hospital in Cleveland.

My eyes went to the name of the mother: Clara Higgins.

My maiden name.

And the date of birth was October fourteenth, twenty-two years ago.

My throat went completely dry.

“Where did you get this?” I whispered, my voice barely audible over the sound of the rain.

“Before you say anything else, Clara, you need to know she is your daughter,” Dave said.

He took a step toward me, his face wet with rain and tears.

“She is the baby you gave up for adoption when you were seventeen.”

I felt my legs start to give way, and Dave caught me, pulling me against his chest.

I couldn’t draw a breath.

Twenty-two years ago, before I met Dave, I had been a scared, lonely teenager in a strict Catholic home.

My parents had sent me away to a home for unwed mothers in Cleveland.