He set the mug back in the cupboard. He’d wrap it up later, add it to the growing list of tasks he kept finding excuses to put off. Like that touch-up painting. Matt glanced at the can of gloss enamel on the kitchen table, then at the doorway to the laundry room. Marks on the trim paint—pencil, pen, felt marker—measuring Kate’s growth from preschool age. Far from engineering perfect, since she’d cheated by rising on tiptoe more than a few times. “I’m a big girl, Daddy. How big does it take to drive a car?” On her way, even then.
There was no need to tell Kate about the house. She wasn’t coming back.
- + -
Kate awakened in the dark, confused. She moved before she remembered not to and felt a merciless jab of pain in her ribs. The hospital. She squinted at the wall clock, barely illuminated by a shaft of light through the partially closed door, and struggled to get her bearings: third-floor medical wing. She’d been admitted, after—
“You awake?” The voice was deep, sleepy, and accompanied by the squeak of a chair.
“Wes?”
“Yes, ma’am.” The chair scraped on the floor, and his hand found hers atop the woven cotton blanket. “How are you feeling?”
“Sore. Everywhere.” She shook her head, causing an ache deep in her eye sockets. “It’s after 3 a.m. You’re still here?”
“Yep.” His chuckle merged into a yawn. “Better than some places I’ve slept—no cactus.”
She smiled, thinking of what he’d told her about his search-and-rescue training. The wilderness test for twenty-four hours with only his pack and his instincts. To see if he had the “right stuff.” His thumb brushed the back of her hand, warm and gentle. It struck her that she’d never met a man who had so much of the right stuff. Wes was the kind of man . . . I could love.
Her eyes widened. Where had that come from? It had to be the concussion. “Have you heard anything more about Harley?”
“Temperature’s normal. Eating like a champ.”
“Good. It was so cold out there.” Kate grimaced, remembering her own search for this baby. Running in the night, shouting her name, needing so desperately to . . . make up for what I did to my own son? “I’m glad you found her in time.”
“She was strapped in the car seat and sort of limp. She didn’t blink at my light and her skin was really cold. Almost like with Baby Doe. You know.”
I know. Kate closed her eyes against a wave of queasiness.
“I thought she was dead.” The chair squeaked again as Wes leaned forward. Kate felt the warmth of his nearness more than she saw his features. “Two months old. Helpless. And her mother dumps her.” His hand slid away from hers.
Kate’s head began to throb.
“I don’t understand how someone can do that,” Wes continued. “I never have.”
There was something in his voice that frightened her. Hinted at things she couldn’t bear. Kate wanted him to stop, wished he hadn’t stayed.
“That night with my mother. When she drove into the river . . .” He exhaled and cleared his throat. “I was with her.”
No.
“My dad was in Fort Worth on business. She woke me up in the middle of the night and herded me to the car. I was barefoot and it was muddy. I remember worrying that I’d get the upholstery dirty. She said it didn’t matter.” His shadow moved like he was shaking his head. “I was never allowed to eat in the car because of crumbs, and all of a sudden mud didn’t matter. We drove a long time. The radio was playing a Reba McEntire song. ‘How Blue.’ I don’t know why I remember that song so clearly. Anyway, I guess I fell asleep. I woke up to the sound of water and saw our headlights on the river. Whitecaps. I’d never seen it like that. I asked her why we were there. She didn’t answer. I remember the low-water crossing sign. Our wheels spinning in the mud. Then the car sort of lurched forward. I started to cry. I think she was crying too.”
Oh, dear God.
“The front tires were in the water. I climbed over the seat, begging her to turn around. I said everything I could think of. I remember telling her that Dad had to help me finish my pinewood derby car. That I’d be the only Scout in the troop who didn’t get to race. I think I knew we weren’t coming back.”
Kate’s stomach roiled.
“Then all of a sudden she backed up and turned the car around. Followed an overgrown hunting trail for a ways and told me to get out. To be a good boy. That was it. She left me in the dark and drove away.”
“That’s . . . so awful,” Kate whispered. “Wes, I—”
“When I talked to Mom earlier,” he continued, his tone different now, “she told me she would be praying for everybody. Harley, you, the Spragues. She’ll be praying for that baby’s mother too. It’s the right thing to do, I suppose. I wish I could, Kate. But I know what it feels like to have your mother dump you like you’re so much trash. I don’t understand it and I can’t make it right no matter which way I look at it. How can I forgive something like that? It’s all the same: my mother, Trista Forrester, that girl who left her newborn on the bathroom—”
Kate retched. “I’m sorry. . . . I feel sick.”
Wes sprang up, grabbed an emesis bag. “I’ll tell the nurse you need something for nausea.”
The IV medication took the edge off Kate’s headache and painful ribs. It settled her stomach too but made her light-headed and woozy and slurred her speech enough that it was impossible to talk. It blurred the broad-shouldered shadow that remained when Wes once again fell asleep—so close that his head touched the edge of her bed. She could feel him breathe.
Despite the medicine, Kate couldn’t sleep. Not because of pain or nausea or even because of the horrific events of last night. She was sleepless because even with her eyes closed, she saw images of a frightened Scout abandoned in the dark woods. And heard, over and over, the heart-wrenching question posed by that boy grown into a man. The only man that—if even just for a delirious moment—she’d ever imagined loving: “How can I forgive something like that?”
There was no medicine strong enough to erase the truth: Kate had done the one thing that Wes Tanner found unforgivable.
She stretched out her hand to touch his hair. Her heart cramped. It felt silky and soft against her fingers. And a lot like . . . good-bye.
“YOU’RE SURE I CAN’T DO SOMETHING MORE, DARLIN’?” Lauren peeked through the doorway of Kate’s steamy bathroom. “Maybe dab a little concealer over that bruise on your cheek? So you won’t look quite like—”
“I fell in a sinkhole?” Kate stopped rubbing the towel over her hair and squinted into the mirror. The bruise was ugly, but she knew it was far from the worst of it. My entire life is a pathetic sinkhole. Makeup wouldn’t fix that.
“I’ve got some mineral powder in my purse,” Lauren continued. “We’ll blend the edges real good.”
“Thank you, but no.” Kate tightened the belt on her chenille robe and took a step, felt the pain of a wrenched knee. “You brought me home, stood by while I got the mud out of my hair, laid out my clothes, put food in my fridge, and made coffee. That’s more than enough.”
“And I led reporters right to your door. I had no idea they’d follow my car, Kate. I’m so sorry.”
Kate summoned a smile. “My landlord’s handling it. He may look like something out of a Rockwell painting, but I know for a fact that man has an Alaskan bear mounted on his family room wall. He’ll keep the media away.”
“Good.” Lauren stepped aside to let Kate limp through the doorway, then followed her to the living room and helped her settle on the couch.
“You know—” Lauren handed her a mug of steaming cinnamon-laced coffee—“the hospital staff is singing your praises. Saying how brave it was of you to go looking for Harley.” Her voice dropped, soft and tentative. “And they think finding the bones was the next best thing to a flat-out miracle.”
“They believe it’s Sunni too.”
“Everyone does. They’re sad, but it could mean some emotional closure.” Lauren glanced towar
d the window. “That’s probably what those reporters want. To hear firsthand what it felt like to find the remains of what could possibly be a fellow nurse.” Her blue eyes were filled with compassion. “I can’t even imagine.”
Kate took a sip of her coffee, hoping it would still her shivering. “I didn’t have time to feel anything,” she said, avoiding her friend’s gaze. “It happened so fast and then I fell.”
Lauren’s patient silence was a reminder that she was a peer counselor as well as a friend.
“I hear Harley’s doing well,” Kate said to fill the pause.
“They’ll probably keep her another day, then release her to emergency foster care. It doesn’t sound like there was any stability in that home. And now Trista’s under psychiatric evaluation.” Lauren shook her head. “The most horrible thing occurred to me today.”
Join the club. “What?”
“Remember when I told you that I first met Trista because she’d left Harley alone in the ER waiting room?”
“Yes . . .”
Lauren pressed her hand to her chest. “Kate, she was outside . . . and looked nervous when I spotted her. What if Trista was trying to abandon her baby even then?”
Wes’s words prodded. “She left me . . . and drove away.”
“I didn’t catch it,” Lauren whispered. “Even with that Safe Haven brochure in her hand. I completely missed it.”
“It’s all the same: my mother, Trista Forrester, that girl who left her newborn . . .”
“Kate?” Lauren leaned forward. “Are you okay, sweetie?”
“Headache. Queasy. It’ll pass.” If only that were true.
“Well . . .” Lauren reached for the knit throw and tossed it over Kate, tucking it gently around her painful knee. “I don’t think you should push it. I think you should do what Evelyn said when she came by your hospital room this morning. Take next week off.”
“Maybe I will.” Kate saw the surprise on her friend’s face.
“Good. Thursday and Friday are holidays anyway.”
Thanksgiving. She wasn’t going to think about Wes and his family.
“I’m going now. So you can get some rest.” Lauren stacked the coffee cups. “You sure you don’t want me to help you with that bruise? And maybe a dab of lip gloss? It always makes me feel better. Plus, I just know Wes’s truck is going to pull into your driveway any min—”
“No. I’m fine.” Kate made herself smile despite a debilitating wave of sadness. “I’m going for the natural look. California girl.”
And Wes won’t be coming here anymore.
- + -
“There you are.” Wes sat on a step of his parents’ porch, cell phone to his ear, and stretched out his legs. “I was getting worried. You didn’t answer my texts. I was about to climb in the truck and—”
“I was asleep,” Kate interrupted. “I took one of those pain pills. I guess it sort of zonked me.”
“Good,” he told her, remembering her bruised, lost-waif expression when she left the hospital this morning. “Get some rest. Don’t worry; I won’t expect you to twirl on a dance floor tonight.”
“Tonight?”
He smiled. “It’s Sunday. We hadn’t firmed up our plans yet, but—”
“I can’t. My face is all bruised and I’m limping now. There are reporters outside. I . . . can’t.”
“No problem. I’ll come there. You can let me in through the back door if that’s better. I’ll bring whatever you feel like eating. Plus Blue Bell ice cream. And a movie. Your pick—even that new tearjerker romance my sister’s raving about. I’m swallowing my pride here, so take advan—”
“I don’t think so.”
He got a bad feeling. “Action film?”
A sigh. “I meant I don’t think you should come over, Wes.”
“Why not?” he asked, torn between the bad feeling and a new concern. “Are you feeling worse? Your knee?”
“No. It’s . . . I don’t feel like seeing anybody.”
I’m “anybody” now? What was going on?
“I’ll call you later,” she said, the tone in her voice too reminiscent of when she’d admitted to sending her father away.
“Look . . .” Wes stood, glanced toward the house. “I told Mom I’d help her set up the crib. I’ll be finished in half an hour. Then I’ll swing by your place. I won’t stay long. I want to make sure you’re okay, and—”
“A crib?” There was something seriously wrong with Kate’s voice.
“For Harley,” he explained. “I told you in the text; my parents are taking her in for emergency foster care.”
There was a sound like a small, wounded animal.
“Kate?”
“Of course,” she whispered. “You rescue her. And your family takes her in. It all makes perfect sense. So . . . perfect.”
Wes checked his watch. “I’ll be there at—”
“Don’t come.”
He struggled to make sense of it. There was none. “Kate . . .”
She was silent so long he thought they’d lost the connection. “Please, Wes. Stay away.”
“Why? What’s wrong?”
“Us.”
His heart stalled. “What does that mean?”
“I can’t see you. . . . I can’t do this.”
- + -
Kate limped to the window, thinking how odd it was to have the glass shiny-clear when everything felt so sodden and dark. Her landlord was still on the lawn pretending to rake leaves while he watched for invading reporters. The car in the driveway was his daughter’s; she’d brought the grandkids for a visit, no doubt. The news vans were gone for now.
Kate shook her head, remembering what Lauren said about the staff praising her failed search for Harley. And the “miracle” in finding the unearthed remains. Lauren guessed the news reporters were eager to hear how it felt to make that unimaginable discovery. Kate told her that it had happened too fast to feel anything at all. She’d lied.
What Kate felt in the horrid moment she realized it was Sunni was a dizzying flash of anger. The same confusing rage that sent her railing at the homeless woman scamming for a baby’s funeral. Soul-deep, humiliating anger. That’s what she’d felt, all she’d felt. What would the reporters do with that ugly truth? What would her staff think? The grieving Spragues? Lauren? Wes?
Kate squeezed her eyes shut, remembering the darkness and the cold and her shoes heavy with mud. How the flashlight beam bumped across the dark earth and debris in her almost-visceral need to find a baby—not abandon one this time but find one. Save one. And then in some cruel twist, she was holding a bone in her hands. Sunni Sprague’s. The skeletal remains of the perfect person Kate could never measure up to. The compassionate, self-sacrificing, and much-loved woman who’d made Kate’s life beyond miserable from the first day she’d arrived at Austin Grace. A sainted ghost who reminded her how very much she was lacking. Every . . . single . . . day.
Kate limped back to the couch and pulled the blanket over herself again, cold despite her jeans and sweater. She let her gaze travel the room and told herself that she’d never belonged here. She’d been fooling herself about the sense of home she’d felt in this little house—in Austin, the city Wes called the Violet Crown.
She pushed the memory aside. Kate was no more of a nester than Roady. And true to form, the stump-tailed cat was gone again. As for her tenuous position at Austin Grace . . .
Kate jumped as her cell phone buzzed: Barrett Lyon.
“How’s the pretty noggin?” There was a leer in his tone.
“I’m okay.” Kate wondered if it was possible to despise him more than she did this very minute.
“More than okay, I’d say. Now that you’ve delivered the goods.”
“Goods?”
“The lovely bones.”
Kate decided it was very possible to despise him more.
“Everyone thinks you’re amazing,” Lyon told her. “And I could kiss you.”
“No, you can’t.”
/>
He laughed. “I meant that your adventure has provided a perfect distraction. The media’s all over it. No one has time for pointing fingers on behalf of Baby Doe.”
“How can I forgive something like that?” Wes’s words whispered.
“Was there something you needed?” Kate asked. “I’m supposed to be resting.”
“I only wanted to let you know that there’s no news regarding Ava Smith. The lead from the memorial service didn’t pan out. The little girl’s still out there somewhere, keeping her head down. So we’re good.”
Good? Kate closed her eyes.
“I heard another intriguing bit of information today.” Barrett paused, letting his news dangle like he was teasing a dog with a table scrap. Kate would rather starve. “The medical examiner’s report isn’t complete, but my source tells me there are signs Baby Doe may have died several days before his birth.”
Kate’s breath caught. “Stillborn?”
“Not yet official. But that conclusion would certainly take pressure off the hospital. Of course, I’m prepared to handle it any way it falls. Meaning we still have Dana Connor as our bird in the hand. But so far so good.” Barrett gave a low chuckle. “And along those lines, I’d say the amazing Kate Callison is looking awfully good for our permanent emergency department director. Trust me on that. I think a celebration will be in order. When you’re feeling better, let’s get together for that din—”
“Bye.” Kate disconnected, then took a moment to delete the recent flurry of unread text messages. Her father, Lauren, the ER. And the three Wes sent earlier—she hadn’t had the heart to read them. Still didn’t.
“I can’t see you. . . .”
She’d deleted the last message when the phone buzzed and its preview screen lit with Wes’s name and four words:
I’m on your porch.
WES STEPPED OVER THE THRESHOLD, grateful Kate was letting him in. He’d felt like a fool sending a text when she was yards away but figured she might think it was a reporter if he knocked.
“You are bruised,” he said, closing the door behind him. “It looks sore.”
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