The Kindred Soul of Nora Faye: The Tethered Soul Series, Book 3

by Laura C. Reden

  “OK. Thanks,” I said, deflated. So much for my brilliant plan. I’d have to find another way to spy on the little girl. Oh god. Could I hear myself? Was I going crazy? Was this how my life turns out? I wind up with a restraining order from a five-year-old? And did she really call me ma’am?

  Dr. Faye walked up to me as I stood on the curb contemplating my bright future. “You couldn’t wait either?” he asked.

  I smiled, my eyes wide with alarm. If only he knew what I had been plotting. “I was anxious, I guess,” I said. That much was true.

  “Yeah, me too.”

  “Where is Nora’s mom?” I asked absentmindedly. “Oh my god. That was really rude of me to assume. . .” I said, searching his face and wishing I could take it back.

  “No, it’s alright. My wife and I work at the hospital, so our hours are atypical.”

  “Oh, yeah. Right. Well, I know you just moved here, and our daughters seemed to hit it off, so if you want to get them together at the park, that would be fun. . .” I shrugged. The class let out, and the kids were released one at a time. I watched, waiting for Clara, hoping that she would wear a giant smile on her face. And I may or may not have been looking for Nora, too.

  “That would be wonderful. Do you still have my number?” Dr. Faye asked.

  “Huh?”

  “My emergency number, it’s my cell phone.”

  “Oh, no. I don’t have it anymore.” I said. Because that would be weird if I hung on to it.

  “Let me give it to you then,” he said.

  I pulled out my phone and typed his name in. When his contact came up with both office and personal cell phone numbers, I pretended to enter it all over again. Clara ran up to me during the last two digits and slammed into my legs.

  “Mommy!” she screeched. I kneeled, giving her a tight hug. It was only my first day alone in the house, but I missed her much more than I expected. As I grasped my daughter tight, Nora came up behind her back, and our eyes met for the first time. If I hadn’t known any better, I’d think my heart stopped beating for one breathless moment. She was stunning. Her blue eyes, her dark hair, the way her nose turned up ever so slightly. She stole my breath away because, deep down inside, I knew her. Was she really my Molly? Did she recognize me too?

  “How was school, Nora?” Dr. Faye asked his daughter.

  “Fun. I met a friend,” Nora said, pointing at Clara. I stood up slowly, with caution. I was beginning to feel unwell.

  “Are you alright, Becca? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  I stared at the doctor as he held his blue-eyed daughter. She looked so much like him. There really was no explanation for what I had conjured in my head.

  “I’m fine, doctor. Just a little light-headed is all,” I said.

  “I’m not your doctor anymore. Call me John.”

  “OK, John,” I said, even more uncomfortable now that we were on a first-name basis.

  “And do call me. We’ll get these girls together,” he said.

  I blushed, “I will.” I watched them walk away before I gathered myself. When Clara and I fastened our seatbelts, she began telling me about her day. A lot of it had to do with her friendship with Nora, and I may have pried just a little.

  “So you two are friends?” I asked.

  “Yeah!”

  “That’s so great! How did you know you were friends?”

  “What?”

  “Like how did you know you wanted to be her friend?” I adjusted my rear-view mirror so that I could see her face.

  “Um, because, Mommy. I just know,” she said, and like me, it was the only explanation that I could come up with too.

  Chapter 23

  Easton didn’t get home from work until nearly midnight. He walked into our bedroom stealthily, trying hard not to wake me, but I hadn’t been able to sleep. I watched his silhouette weave in and out of the bathroom, each time wearing one less layer. When he slipped in bed, I reached my hand on top of his chest and placed my head on his shoulder. I opened my mouth several times to tell him about Nora, but every time it ended in silence and shame. I knew that the hole in my heart had never healed from losing Molly. And I knew that this was my way of coping with that loss. I would have believed anything if it made her whole again. And there was the problem.

  “What’s wrong?” Easton asked when my tears dribbled to his shoulder. “Hey, what’s wrong?” he sat up and wrapped his arms around me.

  “It’s Molly,” I cried.

  “Oh, honey. It’s OK. Shhh. It’s going to be OK,” he said, rubbing my shoulder like he’d done a million times before.

  “No. It’s not that. Easton, I think she’s alive,” I said, sitting up.

  “You what?” Easton shook his head.

  “Clara met a friend today at school. She said she just knew that they were meant to be friends. She just knew!” I searched Easton’s face lit by the moon for any inclination he might believe me. I saw no signs.

  “Clara made a friend today?”

  “Yeah, but she’s not just a friend . . . She’s her twin!”

  “What? She looks just like Clara?” Easton’s voice rose, and his back stiffened like a board.

  “Well, no. Not just like her. I mean, actually, they don’t look alike at all. But—” I stammered.

  “I’m sorry, Beck. Help me understand right now, because I can’t wrap my mind around this. You think Molly is alive because Clara made a friend?” Easton’s tone was now sharp, and I could tell his patience was wearing thin.

  “I know. I know I sound crazy. I’m not, though. There’s something there. Something in the way she looked at me. Easton, you’ve got to believe me!” I cried. The desperation in my voice scared me. I didn’t recognize myself. Easton sucked in a deep breath and hugged me tightly. I knew this wasn’t what he wanted to come home to after a long shift, and it only made me feel more guilty for losing my wits. “I just miss her so much. I have this hole in my heart, Easton, and it won’t heal. It never heals!” I sobbed, unsure of when it would ever end. If it ever could end. I cried until I was too exhausted to lift my head, and the tears had run dry. It reminded me of the nights I’d spent balling in my truck when Clara was a newborn. I hadn’t cried like this for months, maybe a year.

  “I’ll tell you what. I’ll do a little research when I have some time at work. Just get me some names, and I’ll see what I can find,” Easton said. I don’t know if he said it because he was curious about Molly being tethered or if he said it to make me feel better, but either way, I’d sleep a little better knowing that this wasn’t over yet. If my little girl was out there, I had to know about it.

  “It’s Dr. John Faye . . .” I whispered.

  “. . . Wait, wasn’t that your doctor?” he asked. I looked up to him with all the strength I had left and watched him lose faith in me all over again. “You're not telling me you think he stole our baby . . . Are you?” Easton pulled away.

  “I mean, I hadn’t thought about it like that but . . . now that you say it . . .” My head spun with the possibilities.

  “No. Beck No. I’m sorry. That’s just not—”

  “I know. I know. I just thought that maybe she became tethered, but now that you say it, he was there. Maybe he just stole her.” I had been on drugs after all.

  “Do you really think he would steal our baby and then move to our neighborhood?” Easton asked.

  I thought about it. It would be pretty reckless, and he was a smart guy. “Yeah, you’re right. He wouldn’t do that.”

  “Beck, do you think you need to talk to someone?” Easton asked gently.

  “Look, there’s nothing a therapist is going to tell me I don’t already know. So, no. I don’t need to talk to anyone. I’ll let you go to sleep, but just promise me you will look into Dr. Faye,” I said.

  “You really want me to look into your doctor?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then promise me something in return. You won’t do anything stupid.”

  “What
? What would I possibly—” I started.

  “Breaking into somebody’s house. Does that sound familiar?” Easton crossed his arms over his chest.

  I lifted my hands into the air and glared at the ceiling, remembering that Easton had been my partner in crime once upon a time. Now, he was a cop. “Yeah, I promise. I will not do anything stupid!”

  My alarm didn’t have to wake me in the morning. My eyes had still been strapped to the ceiling by the time it went off. I startled, turning it off quickly so that it wouldn’t wake Easton. I’d been so ashamed of my late-night conspiracy theory that I hadn’t been able to fall asleep. I tried to tell myself it was ridiculous, but when I dropped Clara off at school, and Nora looked at me, my hair stood on end. It took everything in me not to take her in my arms and squeeze her tight. Thank god I didn’t. I’d probably have been taken away. As my luck would have it, Easton would be the one to cuff me. I pinched the bridge of my nose and inhaled slow and methodically.

  I’d felt hopeless before when Molly passed, but this was a whole new kind of hopelessness. I hoped Nora was Molly. I hoped she was OK. I hoped I wasn’t . . . insane. It felt that way sometimes, and now more than ever. I wished that Easton and Clara wouldn’t see it. Though that crazy part of me was stronger than I wanted it to be, I’d do what I could to keep it hidden. I didn’t believe it was the best side of me.

  I sat in my empty house, growing more and more leery of Dr. Faye as the silence ticked by. I cleaned the house from top to bottom and had ventured into an old linen closet just to keep my body moving. It didn’t help my mind from wandering, though, and most of my thoughts revolved around what I could do to ensure that both of my daughters grew up in a happy and healthy home. I thought of the future and wondered how I could finagle my way into the girl’s life and not be cast aside if she were to move again.

  A lawsuit was the only thing I could think of . . . Apart from kidnapping, but that went against my simple rule of not letting my family see just how crazy I’d become. Whatever I did, I couldn’t jeopardize my life with Clara and Easton to chase after a life with Molly that may or may not exist. I’d already done that in the first six weeks of Clara’s birth. It wasn’t fair to any of them, Molly included. And though it was hard to look at Clara and not be reminded of what I’d lost in Molly, I learned to do it over time. I felt terrible that it was an instinct of mine, but there was no right or wrong with mourning the loss of your child. It all had to unfold in its own unique way. I was just grateful that my way ended with Molly coming back to me.

  Concealing the battle within me was more difficult than I expected it to be. The best way I knew how was distance. I put as much distance between the Faye family and me as I could. It had been nearly four months since I laid eyes on Nora, and since then, my mental state had declined considerably. Easton and I would argue every time I brought it up, and eventually, I stopped talking about it. But every day at school pick up, I watched from the parking lot. John picked up most days, but on the days he didn’t, a nanny would. They were on their second nanny, and I wondered what happened to the first. I hated seeing my daughter go home with a stranger. It had been isolating to watch from afar, and I wasn’t sure I could do it any longer. Before today, I had barely been able to hold myself back. I knew my patience was wearing thin.

  I bit my lip when Clara and Nora surfaced from their classroom, holding hands. It took a lot of willpower to hold myself back from asking Dr. John Faye for a play date. That’s why I stood just outside my truck door when the doctor was under the overhang of the school. Originally, I was trying to wait for Easton to get back to me with his police research, but he never did. I waved when John glanced in my direction, then continued to bite a hole into my lip until the copper taste of blood had surfaced. I shook my head, trying to dispel the crazy, but I knew now it wasn’t possible. All I ever wanted after having children was to protect them, and that was instinct. Instinct wasn’t a habit that could be changed. I knew from experience. As much as I hated this obsessive, burning side of me, I had to learn to live with it.

  Maybe it was the taste of blood in my mouth, or simply that my willpower had finally worn out, but before I knew it, something in me snapped. My legs were moving across the parking lot towards the overhang. My mind a battlefield, my legs taking long forward strides.

  “Hi John, how are you?” I asked, coming up by his side.

  He turned to me and smiled. “I’m well. How are you doing?”

  “Great, hey, I was going to take Clara to the park after school today. Did you two want to join us?” Don’t Beck…

  “Um . . . Sure, I think we have time for the park,” John said, reluctantly.

  “Great! Oh, but it’s kind of cold outside today. Should we just go to my house instead?” Stop this Beck. . .

  “Umm . . . OK. That would work too.”

  “Yeah, because I have hot chocolate for the kids, so. . .” I nodded.

  “Right,” John shrugged, peering at me oddly. Did he think I was coming on to him? Was he into it? My eyes darted about and landed on my daughter.

  “Hi, honey. Nora is going to come over for a play date today. Won’t that be fun?” I asked, kneeling beside her and taking her backpack.

  “Really?” She squealed. They both did. I stood, tossing her bag over my shoulder and smiling at the doctor.

  “Follow me?” I asked. He nodded, looking somewhat unsure. I checked my watch. Easton would be home in the next hour, and I wondered if this fell under the ‘doing something stupid’ category or not. The thought dissipated when I realized I did not have hot chocolate at the house. How was I supposed to be luring this man and his daughter to our house when I didn’t even have hot chocolate for the kids?

  John pulled into our driveway after me, and when I opened the door, the girls ran down the hall towards Clara’s room leaving John and me alone. My face flushed at the awkwardness of it all, and as a result, my mouth ran a mile a minute, trying to fill the silence.

  “Come on in. Can I get you some tea? Soda? Water? Um, I don’t think I have hot chocolate, now that I think about it, but I’m sure I have some of the fun-sized chocolate bars leftover from Halloween if—”

  “No, thank you.”

  “Oh. OK,” I stopped rambling off the contents within our pantry to the man I thought may have stolen my child and closed the cabinet doors. I swallowed the lump in my throat and walked over to the sofa. Sitting across from him, I had to ask myself why he appeared so comfortable. Had he known that I knew? Was he going to steal Clara too? “So tell me about . . . Um. . .” The words caught in my throat as the girls came barreling down the hall, giggling.

  “Man, I don’t think I’ve ever seen Nora this happy,” John said. I smiled, my eyes lingering on his before looking to the girls. Maybe this wasn’t a reckless idea after all. The girls were having fun. Nora squealed and clapped her hands right in front of Clara’s face, causing Clara to jump back. Both girls peeked into Nora’s hands as she opened them ever so slowly. When her palms were open wide, they both giggled . . . identically. It was music to my ears. Did every little girl have a similar laugh? I didn’t think so.

  “What are you girls doing?” John asked.

  “We’re catching lights!” Nora said. My smile melted, leaving me with a low-hanging jaw. Then smack! Another clap. This one caught with a skip and a jump. I watched the girls peek inside Nora’s hands with renewed hope and scream with delight when nothing had been there. I closed my mouth, but I couldn’t stop my eyes from watering. Had this simply been how little girls played? Or had Nora been catching the love she saw surrounding her sister?

  The front door opened, and Easton walked in. He stalled taking in the doctor on our sofa, and I used the distraction to blot my eyes. I stood up with trembling hands and motioned to Easton. “You remember Easton, my husband,” I said.

  Easton placed his hand on his gun, giving John a subtle warning that did not go unnoticed by either of us.

  Chapter 24

  “E
aston, so good to see you again.” John held his hand out, and I turned away from both of them to pull myself together. Easton had been such a loving and supportive man that I feared the reason he felt the need to warn the doctor with his subtle gesture. Easton was no longer the tall thin guy I had fallen in love with, he had packed on the muscle for his training, and his frame was quite impressive. When he was in uniform, his bullet-proof vest added to his bulk, making him quite intimidating. Why he needed to grip his gun in his own home was beyond me. Had it been because John was so good-looking? Easton had never been jealous before. Or was it something deeper than that? Had he discovered something about him? Something incriminating?

  “Doctor,” Easton said, taking his hand. The tension was so thick it could be cut with a knife. I sat back down, rubbing the back of my neck and looking anywhere but either of them. I could feel Easton’s eyes burrowing into mine, and I knew he was cursing me for taking it a step too far. I didn’t blame him. “So, I hear the girls have become fast friends,” Easton said, breaking the ice. I took a deep breath, thankful for his presence.

  “Yes, I was just telling Becca that I’d never seen Nora take to anyone quite like she has your daughter. It’s refreshing to see.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Yeah, it’s been such a blessing, really. . .” John said.

  “That’s great. And you just moved here?” Easton asked as the girls ran down the hall, a trail of fireflies following them.

  “This is Nora,” I said. Easton looked toward the little girl, and I thought I saw it behind his eyes . . . The recognition. But it was my own emotions that hindered me from reading his face clearly. He watched her carefully, his eyes more than curious.

  “Yes, we were closer to the hospital for work, but the schools out there—” John’s voice echoed in the background as I watched Easton’s eyes on Nora. It was then that I realized something . . . My eyes traveled from him to her. Nora didn’t have dark hair and blue eyes like her father. Instead, she had them like Easton. She was nearly his spitting image, whereas Clara had looked just like me.