Free Love Me Tonight by Gwynne Forster

cremini mushrooms, asparagus and dauphin potatoes,a green salad and assorted cheeses, and ended with raspberry sauce over vanilla ice cream.
    â€œI didn’t have time to make a complicated dessert today,” she told him.
    â€œPlease, don’t apologize, Heather. I love ice cream, and raspberries are one of my favorite fruits. This combination is delightful.”
    After sipping his second cup of espresso, he said, “You told me you were a fair cook. That was an understatement. This was a wonderful meal. Let’s clean the kitchen. Then we can talk.”
    After they cleaned the kitchen, he took her hand and walked with her to the living room. “Heather, I have an awful suspicion. After today, I not only have to find out who my birth father is, but I have to find proof that my adoptive mother is really my birth mother.”
    â€œWhat? Are you serious? What do you mean?”
    â€œThe woman with whom I spent this morning in Hagerstown was Mom’s aunt. Cissy is her father’s youngest sister. She stated Mom had a baby boy when she was twenty-two or twenty-three years old, left the child with her mother and then moved away from Hagerstown. When the boy was three, she had married and came back for the child. Her aunt didn’t know her exact age when the child was born, but I believe she guessed right. I’m thirty-four and when Mom died, she was fifty-seven. You can add as well as I can.
    â€œAunt Cissy—Cissy Henry is the woman’s name—gave me enough information to identify the father of that child. He was an architect, and I have a brochure printedtwo weeks before I was born that’s proof he designed and built a hotel that still stands in Hagerstown.”
    â€œWhich one? Not the Americana?”
    He lurched forward. “That’s the one.”
    â€œWe can ask my father if he knew him.”
    â€œI have his name. Now I have to find out what the relationship was between him and my mom. Aunt Cissy says they were lovers. My question is, am I the product of that union?”
    â€œToo bad you don’t have your birth certificate.”
    â€œNo, but I’ll get it.”
    â€œMind if I ask… You seem, well, not merely pleased, but in some kind of peaceful mood. That’s unusual for you, at least the times I’ve been with you. When you came in here tonight, I actually thought you had found the answer. Explain this to me.”
    He leaned forward and braced his elbows on his thighs. “This dilemma has troubled me since I was seven years old, and the older I got the more it haunted me. Today, for the first time, I took steps to get the answer. It isn’t in my nature to do nothing about a situation. When I have a problem, I get to work on it.”
    â€œWhat’s your next move?”
    â€œWhen I get home tonight, I’ll continue my search, but I’ll be looking in unlikely places. Mom had something to hide, and I suspect that Dad didn’t know her secret. Where would you hide things from someone who had the run of the house, including your bedroom?” He took a small pad from his inside coat pocket.
    â€œProbably with my lingerie, jewelry, toiletries, the most personal things. If she had shoe bags, searchthem, even her shoes. Check the house for books with hidden storage. Look in the jackets of records and under mattresses.”
    He glanced toward the ceiling. “I’d decided to check the lingerie drawers, but I hadn’t considered those other places. Thanks, and keep thinking. If I don’t find what I want in any of those places, I’ll ask you again for suggestions. I’d better go, because I know I won’t go to sleep until I’ve searched every one of those places.”
    â€œTomorrow is another day, Judson. If I’d known this could keep you up all night, I wouldn’t have mentioned them.”
    He stood to leave. “Do you mind if I leave now?”
    It was only ten o’clock.