Eternally Yours - Brenda Jackson [104]
Syntel raked his fingers through his tousled hair. The expression on his face was pained, disbelieving, enraged. “That can’t be true,” he said in a strained voice choked with deep emotion. “My father would not have been that cruel, that heartless, that hateful. He would not have turned his back on his own grandchild, my child, my own flesh and blood,” he said, as if trying to convince himself. But looking at the sympathy in his best friend’s eyes and Clayton’s, he knew deep down his father had done just that.
“Where is she? Oh, God, please tell me you know where she is now.”
Clayton stood and faced the man. He had to swallow in an attempt to remove the lump in his throat. “She lives in New York.”
“New York?”
“Yes.” Pulling his wallet from his pants pocket Clayton took out a picture he’d had taken of Syneda when they had visited Atlanta. As she smiled for the camera, her sea-green eyes shone brightly, her golden-bronze hair flowed about her shoulders and highlighted her light brown complexion.
“This is your daughter, Syntel, the woman I love and plan to marry in June.”
A wry smile touched Clayton’s lips as he realized something. “I often wondered about the origin of her name since it’s unusual. Now I know where it came from. Janeda was thinking of you when she named your daughter. It’s a combination of both your names. However, her middle name is all yours. The woman in this picture is Syneda Tremain Walters.” He handed the picture to Syntel.
Syntel nervously accepted the photograph Clayton handed to him. There was complete silence in the room as he looked at it. His eyes began filling with tears. Suddenly the only sounds in the room were the sounds of Syntel Remington’s heartwrenching sobs.
After Nedwyn and Clayton had left, Syntel Remington sat slumped down in a chair. A spasm of pain flitted across his face when he thought of what his father had done.
Janeda had given him a daughter, and in the end she had believed in their love enough to want him to know about their child, to want him to take care of her, even when they had not seen each other in ten years.
But she had known that his love for her would have survived the test of time and that he would want their child, and that he would take care of her. Janeda had died believing in him.
He couldn’t help but remember the last night he and Janeda had spent together. He was to report to the Air Force Academy the day after graduation. The Vietnam War was on everyone’s mind, and it had been the main thing on his that night. Maybe if it hadn’t been, he would have paid more attention to her mood and the words she had spoken to him. And maybe he would have sensed some sort of a change in her, and noted that something was bothering her.
She had been the joy of his life, his true love. To him the color of their skin had never made a difference. But to her it had. She’d always been afraid of what others would think about it. Interracial relationships had not been accepted during that time, and that was the reason Ned had been used as their go-between and their cover.
Syntel hadn’t cared what others thought, and he had told her that countless times. His love for her was the only thing that mattered to him. But because she had cared, he had respected her wishes.
He closed his eyes remembering that night, their last one together, the night before graduation. They had just made love and he’d been holding her in his arms, never wanting to let her go…
Janeda snuggled closer to him. “We’re so different,” she said, looking deep into his eyes.
He smiled down at her. “No, we aren’t. You just got a better tan than I do,” he said jokingly.
She smiled back at him, then suddenly her expression became serious. “I’m afraid.”
He pulled her closer. “Don’t be. Everything’s going to work out