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Her eyelids were heavy, and pain slashed through her head like a knife. She didn’t want to open her eyes. The effort was too much.
“Kiana, please. You have to wake up.”
She knew that voice. It pulled her through the darkness into the light.
Kiana opened her eyes and stared up at bright lights glaring down from the ceiling.
Where was she? When she tried to turn her head, the pain sent her back into the black abyss.
“Kiana, please.”
The voice penetrated the haze, bringing her back to the surface. “Meredith.” The word emerged as a throaty whisper.
“Yes!” the woman said. “It’s me, Meredith. You’re awake. Oh, thank God.” Her voice trailed off into a sob. “I thought you were dead.”
“What happened?” Kiana asked, struggling to push air past her vocal cords.
“They were following you. I couldn’t warn you until almost too late.”
“That was you,” Kiana said, her thoughts fogged with pain. “You called.”
“Yes, it was me,” Meredith said.
“Where have you been? We’ve been looking for you?”
“I was hiding.”
“Why were you hiding from me and Tish?”
Meredith sighed. “It’s a long story.”
Kiana tried to raise her hand, but it wouldn’t move. Her pulse kicked up. “I remember a crash.”
“Yes. They rammed into your van. You must have hit your head.”
A terrible thought pushed her closer to clear consciousness. “Am I paralyzed?”
“I don’t think so,” Meredith said. “You were kicking and flailing when they pulled you out of the van. They wouldn’t have strapped you down if you were paralyzed.”
Kiana fought through the pain to turn her head and look across the few feet separating them to see her friend lying on a gurney, her arms and legs strapped down. “Why are we strapped to gurneys? What’s happening?”
Meredith met Kiana’s gaze, tears filling her eyes. “I think I found my sister.”
Kiana started to nod her head, but the pain kept her from doing so. Instead, she blinked her eyes. “Tina.”
Meredith’s eyes rounded. “You know?”
“Found your journal...and logged onto...the ancestry site.” Why was it so hard to form sentences? God, her head hurt.
“I was so excited to find relatives. I started a conversation with her on the ancestry site, then we moved to social media messaging and discovered we had so much in common—mannerisms, similar tastes in food, the way we sleep at night. I was so happy to finally find a blood relative. We’re not even sure how we’re related. Cousins, half-sisters...it doesn’t matter. She’s family.”
“She’s your half-sister,” Kiana said. “We found birth records for her mother, Martina Akana.” She drew in a breath and let it out. “She’s your mother, too.”
“How do you know?”
“We talked with Joe Akana, the other relative on your ancestry site. He’s Martina’s brother. Your uncle.”
“He’s my uncle?” Tears spilled from Meredith’s eyes.
