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My breath caught in my throat. "What?"
"She was brought in thirty minutes ago," Nurse Miller said.
"That's impossible." I felt suddenly dizzy. I put a bracing hand on the desk in front of me. "My stepmother is in Los Angeles."
"The woman told me her name is Kim Landry. Although, there is some confusion, because her ID gives her name as Laura Hawthorne."
My stomach flipped over. "I don't understand." Kim Landry was my mother's name. But I didn't know a Laura Hawthorne. "Why are you calling me? How did you get my number?"
"It was in her phone. I spoke to your mother briefly when she was brought in. She said to tell you and your sister she's sorry and that she always loved you."
My breath started coming too fast. My mother had died twenty years ago, when I was seven years old. "There must be some mistake. You have the wrong person."
"I don't think so. There's a photo in her wallet of her with two little girls, Brynn and Dani. You're Brynn, right?"
"Yes, but…"
"I just took a picture of the photo. I'm texting it to you," the nurse said.
I opened the text, and the image sent a stabbing pain through my body. I was looking at the same photo that sat on my nightstand, that sat on Dani's nightstand—the last one taken of my mother with Dani and me at a park a month before she died.
"Is that your mother?" the nurse asked.
"Yes," I said, barely able to get the word through my tight lips.
"You should come to the hospital, Ms. Landry."
"What—what happened to her? Was she in an accident?"
"No. She was shot."
Her answer shocked me again. "Shot? Who shot her?"
"I don't know. You can talk to the police about that. I just wanted to let you know that if you want to see your mother, don't delay. Her condition is grave."
The call disconnected, and I struggled to draw a breath.
"Brynn? What's wrong?" Jeff asked, walking toward me with concern. "You look like you've seen a ghost."
"I just heard from one."
"What does that mean?"
"My mother," I said shortly.
"Vicky? Is she all right?" he asked.
I shook my head. "Not my stepmother. My mother."
"I thought your mom died when you were a child."
"I thought so, too. But a nurse from a hospital in San Francisco just called me. She said my mother was shot, and she's in critical condition. She wants me to come right away."
Jeff gave me a disbelieving look. "She must have the wrong person."
"She sent me a photo of my mom with me and Dani. It was in the woman's wallet. And she said her name was Kim Landry, although she had some other name on her ID. But she had my name in her phone. That's why they called me. She wanted me and Dani to know she was sorry." The words poured out of me before I could even process them.
"There has to be an error." His brows furrowed together in a frown. "You should call Dani."
