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“Breathe deep,” he cautions me. “Don’t pass out.”
Don’t pass out? I feel like dying. It takes moments, lots of them, when I finally compose myself and study the mother and child who haven’t even paid us any attention. I feel like a sinkhole should open up and take me. Take me from this earth of betrayal and heartbreak. Finally, I can speak.
“No. The baby died. They…” They told me so. The hospital. My mother. I’d awakened from a nightmare and found I had a deflated belly, my baby balloon gone. She’d died during birth, they’d told me. I clutch my head. Disbelief and realization roll over me in waves.
“How did you…” I shake my head in skepticism and stare at the beautiful little girl. “She’s stunning.”
He nods. “And very happy.”
“Are you thinking to . . .” I don’t want to give voice to my thoughts. And yet, I do. I want to make all my dreams come true—
“No. They love her.” Evidently, he knew where I was going with my question.
I can’t tear my eyes from the little girl and her mother. That should have been me. That should have been us. Ours.
The little one stumbles, would have skinned her knee, but her mother was on her in a shot, catching her before the child hit the railroad tie before her. The girl giggled while her mother swooped her up in her arms and plastered her face with kisses, some gentle, some not so much. The sheer love on the woman’s face takes my breath away.
My emotions are all over the place. And at the top of that heap of emotions is my fury toward my mother.
I heave a sigh.
“She has a gravestone,” I tell him. This much I’m aware of.
“I know. It’s in Leander. I’ve been there.”
My breath catches. Josh has visited her graveside. Wait. Her? Whose? Who’s buried there? Anyone? I shove the thought away because it’s taking me to a very dark place. “I haven’t.” The gravestone’s in the same town where she was born. Even though I don’t remember the birth, since I was unconscious. It’s where my aunt—on my father’s side—lives.
“How did you find all this out?” I ask him.
“Persistence,” is all he says.
“What’s on the gravestone? What name?” I have to know.
“Baby Ransom. And the date she was born.” As an afterthought, he adds. “And the date she died. Same date.” He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out an envelope that’s folded in half and places it on the table.
I’m still curious about how he found this all out. I know there’s got to be more to it. Someone, somewhere, had to have told him something. But how? Who? “What’s this?” I take the envelope.
“Her adoption papers and birth certificate. You’re listed as the mother. The father’s unknown.” Oh, but his voice is so bitter.
I don’t blame him.
Seems Josh isn’t done. He says, “Ask your mother about Liam.”
“I don’t talk to my mother.” Why does he want me to ask her about Liam? Why couldn’t I ask Liam about himself? “What about Liam?” A thought occurs to me. “Do you have to work tonight?”
His brows furrow, a flurry of sentiments cross his face. “I can call someone in to cover for me. Why?”
“Take me to Boar’s Creek.” As an afterthought, I add, “Please.”
It isn’t a long drive to Boar’s Creek, and it certainly isn’t long enough to give me some time to get my emotions and my thoughts together. I intended to talk to my mother. Not because Josh told me to ask her about Liam, though that did pique my interest. Nope. I want to talk to her about how she stole my baby from me and flat-out lied to me. Does she know that the baby made it from Leander to Victoria? That her own grandchild lives not even thirty minutes from her and my father?
My father.
Does he know about this? Is he aware that my mother told me my baby was dead and then put it up for adoption? His sister was the one I stayed with. How could he not know? My heart sunk at the thought of Dad betraying me like this. It’s one thing to refuse to take my side against my mother in an argument. It’s a whole ‘nother thing to let my child be stolen while I was unconscious.
Josh noses his pickup into my parents’ driveway and then brakes to a full stop. He turns to look at me. “Ready?”
I study the oyster shell driveway. It’s not empty. My dad’s truck’s gone—I imagine he’s at work, but my mother’s sparkling brown realtor’s car is here, which means she is too.
