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Yes, our daughter.
Yes, the very life of us…
/> I too want to drop to the ground.
“No,” Karen says now, and her horror is merciful as it yanks me from the memory.
She puts her hand to her mouth. “No—”
And then, she turns and collapses into my arms.
I’m right there to catch her, as if on instinct. Muscle memory kicking in.
She is weeping, hysterical and not surprisingly, her husband turns and walks from the room.
So maybe you can’t exactly change history.
I shake my head. No. I refuse to believe that.
I lower Karen Holmes to the floor, sinking with her. What else am I going to do? I understand. My heart, my soul, understands.
So I hold her, a little awkwardly, maybe, and Burke is giving me a look, but it’s all I have right now.
For both of us.
She weeps and I tighten my grip.
I’m not crying. But my jaw is tight just in case.
Kirchner pulls the sheet back over Gretta’s body.
“We need to ask a few questions,” Burke starts but I shake my head, then nod toward the door. Go after Jeff.
He reads my mind, as usual and heads outside.
Kirchner melds into the wall somewhere, and the room is quiet, save for Karen Holmes’s sobbing.
Her hand fists my shirt, turning it black with her mascara and now I remember why I don’t wear suits. But it’s okay. It’s the least I can do.
Except, I’m going to do more, much more. “I’m so sorry.”
She finally leans away and stares at me, not really seeing me. “We called the police and no one did anything about it. They said she was a runaway, and that she was old enough to leave home, but…” Her jaw trembles.
Parents know, right? When something is wrong?
She finally meets my eyes. “I don’t remember your name.”
“Rembrandt. Inspector Rembrandt Stone.”
She is trying to gather herself, searching her pockets and I remember I still carry a handkerchief, so I hand it to her.
The action feels so familiar, I’m digging through my layers to find the memory, and latch onto a different one.
Eve. She’s sitting in the waiting room of a hospital, on brown chairs, her hands over her head, bent over with the news of Danny’s death. It’s so clear, I can hear her sobbing even as I crouch in front of her, hand her my handkerchief and take her into my arms.
It’s the day I knew, right to my core, that my heart would belong to her. If only I’d spent a little more time listening to that voice instead of my ambition back then. But the memory is swift and thorough and is just as real as Ashley’s death.
Eve will still lose her father and her brother, and then her beloved daughter.
