Chapter 12 - THE GARDEN REUNIONThe French doors pushed open, and I stepped out onto the cobblestone terrace overlooking the rolling Tuscan hills.
In the center of the manicured lawn, sitting on a small wooden picnic bench beneath a blooming lemon tree, was a little girl.
She was about three years old, wearing a yellow summer dress with little white daisies, her curly brown hair tied back with a blue ribbon. She was softly singing to a battered teddy bear resting in her lap.
I stopped dead in my tracks.
All the air rushed out of my lungs. Every tear I had shed over the past three years—every dark, lonely night staring at an empty crib in our Bronx apartment—evaporated in a single, blinding flash of pure maternal recognition.
It was her.
The same dark eyes. The same little dimple in her left cheek.
“Lily...” I whispered, the name breaking like glass in my throat.
The little girl stopped singing. She turned her head slowly toward the terrace, her big dark eyes blinking in confusion as she looked at the stranger standing on the stone steps.
I couldn't hold back another second. I ran down the steps across the lawn, dropping to my knees right in front of the wooden bench.
“Oh, my baby... my sweet baby girl...” I sobbed, wrapping my arms around her small, fragile frame, burying my face in her curly hair as hot tears soaked through her dress.
For a second, the little girl stiffened, startled by the sudden embrace of a stranger. But then, as if something deep inside her DNA recognized the heartbeat against her chest, her tiny arms crept around my neck, and she buried her face in my shoulder.
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“Mama?” she whispered softly, her sweet voice sounding like music in my ears.
“Yes, sweetheart... I’m right here. I’m your mommy, and I am never, ever going to let you go,” I cried, holding her so tightly I thought my heart would burst.
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