The Secret Liaison Read Online Free PDF Page B

really sick lately; along with the loss of appetite and vomiting he was losing a lot of weight.  The over the counter drugs were not working and today she would insist that they go to the hospital.  Bringing tomato soup on a tray she found Austin sleep in a recliner chair.  A slight smile came across her face because he had been trying unsuccessfully to rest and she decided not to disturb him.  Jessica promised herself that if he wasn’t feeling any better when he woke up they were going straight to the hospital.
                  Stretching her tired muscles she decided that taking a nap might not be a bad idea.  They had been working fourteen hour days on the first merger project, both wanting to silence their critics; especially her father in law Joseph Brent.  Shaking her head as she made her way to her bedroom she said “That man is impossible.’ Over the years she heard of the feud between the Dublin’s and the Brent’s but it wasn’t her father who told her about it. Lying in bed she recalled the conversation with her mother that changed her outlook on life and sent her on a quest for the truth.
     
    At twenty eight years old Jessica had accomplished many of her immediate goals in life.  She was on point in her career as she worked really hard to one day take over the company.  Her personal life was hit or miss but the one man that made her heart skip a beat was Austin Brent.  She admired him from afar, but hoped to one day make his acquaintance.  The only thing going wrong in her life was her mother’s illness.  She was suffering from dementia; Roberta Dublin was no longer the vibrant spirit in the Dublin house hold.  One day Jessica was brushing her mother’s hair; this always seemed to relax her.  Roberta was having problems with her short term memory but her long term memory was sharp as a tact.  The problem was she thought the past was the present.  It was hard for Jessica to see her mother this way; she took extra care as she tried to make her comfortable.  While stroking her mother’s long graying hair Roberta began to talk
    “I always wanted a home full of children.  Girls for me to spoil and boys for Dirk to raise in his own likeness.”  She signed deeply, thinking about this appeared to be painful “When the doctor told me I couldn’t have children we were devastated.  I felt so helpless and inadequate.  What kind of woman can’t give her husband babies?”  She began to cry slightly causing Jessica to wrap her arms around her and say “It’s ok ma, because you had me; and I turned out just fine.”  Roberta slowly pulled away from her daughter and said in a shaky voice “The day your father walked in this house with you I was over the moon. 
    We both wanted a baby so badly.  We hoped that a baby would heal the hurtful wounds that had occurred in our relationship.  Dirk thought I didn’t know, but I knew about his affair.” Jessica was shocked she couldn’t even speak; she knew her mother was ill, but was she trying to say that she was adopted, that she wasn’t a Dublin?.  Roberta never noticed her daughter’s reaction she just continued talking as if it was important to get these things off her chest “It hurt me to know he was with her, I closed into myself and suffered in silence, but then he came home with you and my whole world change, our whole world changed.”  Jessica was now standing in a corner trying to digest what her mother said; she was looking at the wall as if the answers would magically appear.  When she turned to see why her mother had suddenly stopped talking she saw that her mother had fallen asleep; she had worn herself out telling her tale.  Jessica wrapped a blanket around her and tried to contemplate what this information meant in her life thinking “I can’t believe they would keep something like this from me.  Who are my parent’s? Where did I come from? Do I have siblings?” The questions that were running through