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Mikaela felt like she’d been punched in the stomach. “I never told you?”
“No. ”
“Oh, Jacey …” Mikaela didn’t know what to say. What kind of woman had she become that she would do this to her daughter? “Jacey, I—”
The door swung open. Sarah bustled into the room, rosy-cheeked and out of breath. “Jacey, I was hoping to find you here. The receptionist just called. She saw Bret run out of the hospital. He wouldn’t stop—”
“Bret! Oh, my God. It’s my fault!” Jacey spun around the heavyset nurse and ran out of the room.
Mikaela looked helplessly at Sarah. “Who’s Bret?”
Sarah gave her a sad, knowing look. “Get your rest, honey. ”
Mikaela’s heart beat too fast. Any second, she expected one of the machines to sound an alarm. The room spun around her, making her sick and dizzy. She grabbed Sarah’s arm, yanked her so hard the nurse hit the bed rail. “Sarah … did you know me … before?”
“Of course. I hired you right out of nursing school. ”
Mikaela released Sarah and sank into the mound of pillows. These facts of her life were meaningless; she wanted the truth of it. “Was I a good person?”
Sarah gazed down at her, smiling softly. “You have the pure heart of an angel, Mikaela. You were—and are—a good person. Believe me. ”
She wanted to believe it, but she couldn’t. She’d lied to her daughter for all these years, and obviously she’d broken Liam’s heart. For the first time, she wondered if this amnesia was a gift from God. A momentary respite that allowed a sinner to feel like a saint.
Julian sat in the familiar cocoon of the limousine, staring at the reporters clustered beyond the smoked glass.
He’d really screwed up today. There was no way around that fact. He’d set the hounds on his own daughter. It hadn’t been broadcast yet, that footage from outside the high school, but he’d heard about it in excruciating detail, the way they’d caught her off guard and thrown questions at her.
How does it feel to be Julian True’s daughter? And the way they’d sniffed out the ugly truth: She doesn’t know.
Outside, he saw Liam push through the crowd of reporters.
Julian couldn’t help himself; he sank deeper into the seat, rubbing his tender jaw. The last person he wanted to talk to right now was Liam Campbell.
Julian was deeply ashamed of what he’d done. Usually when he screwed up, he paid for it. Literally. People who worked for him ran along in his wake, throwing money at anyone whose life or property had been damaged in a brush with Julian True.
Now, for once, he wanted to be a better man than that. He wanted to do the right thing.
He pulled his Ray Bans out of his pocket and slid them onto his face. Then, after running a comb through his tangled hair, he got out of the limo.
It was snowing. Again.
“He’s out!”
Reporters surged toward him, microphones at the ready. They looked as bad as he felt. This weather was too damned cold. He knew that if they were going to stand outside for a story, they’d rather be in Los Angeles, where the elements gave you cancer instead of frostbite.
He barely heard the questions hurled at him. Wordlessly, unsmiling, he pushed through the crowd, knowing they wouldn’t follow him into the hospital. They were like vampires—they had to be invited in.
He was halfway to Kayla’s room when he saw his daughter. She was in the waiting room, standing still as stone, with her back to him.
“Juliana. ” He remembered a second too late that it was the wrong name. “J. C. ”
Slowly she turned around. For a disorienting moment, the past slammed into the present. Her eyes were red and puffy, and her mouth was trembling. She looked exactly like Kayla on the day she left him. “Hi,” was all she said.
“I … was hoping we could talk. I know … you know the truth about me … about us. ”
“Not now. ” She took a step toward him, hugging herself. “My brother ran away. ”
Julian frowned. “What do you mean? I don’t have any other children. ”
“Okay, my half brother. ”
“Jesus,” he whispered. “No one told me there was another one. He’s Kayla’s … and Liam’s?”
She nodded. “His name is Bret. We saw Mom today for the first time since she woke up. She didn’t recognize us. It was bad. Bret … ran away. ”
Julian wanted to help her, say something that would ease her sadness, but he didn’t even know her, couldn’t possibly understand what she needed. No, that wasn’t true. He knew she needed her father.
Liam would know what to do. This moment, and a thousand others like it, had made Liam this girl’s father. There was no way now to turn Julian into that which he was not. “It’s not your fault. Your dad will find him. ”
“Yeah …” She gazed up at him, saying nothing else.
Julian wished he could look into J. C. ’s sad eyes and see his own future, but all he saw was a screwed-up past. “Your dad’s the real thing. He’ll find your brother. Trust me. ”
“Trust you?” Slowly she moved toward him. “Did you ever think about me?”
He knew when a lie was called for, and though he knew a better man would take the high road, he lied. “All the time. ” He flashed her a nervous smile. “You look exactly like your mom when I first met her. You are the two most beautiful women I’ve ever seen. ”
He could see that she didn’t believe him, and worse, that the lie had hurt her, and so he gave her the only gift he could. For once he told the truth: “No, not really. When your mom left me, I … moved on. I loved her—and I could have loved you—but I moved on instead. I’m sorry, but your mom … and your dad love you. And boy, when Kayla loves, it’s one of those out-of-the-ballpark kind of things. ”
She turned away from him and went to stand at the window.
He followed her. He wanted to touch her shoulders, but he didn’t dare. Instead he stared at their reflections, side by side in the tarnished windowpanes. “I’m sorry. For all of it. The reporters, the years I stayed away, the letters I didn’t write. I’m sorry. ”
Then, with his daughter’s silent tears glittering in the windowpane between them, Julian caught a glimpse of his own empty soul. It happened fast, came and went as quickly as a breath taken and released, but he knew he’d never forget.
Liam tried not to think of everything that could go wrong on this dark, December night when God had seen fit to drop the temperature four degrees in the last thirty minutes. Or that Bret was alone out there, his precious nine-year-old son, still more baby than young man, out there all alone, on this coldest of evenings. Did Bret know how dangerous it was to walk along the side of the road when the streets were icy … when visibility was cut in half by the falling snow?
These were lessons Liam didn’t remember passing down to his son, and now his not having done so preyed on his fraying nerves.
He kept glancing at the outside temperature gauge he’d had installed on the dashboard. It was thirty degrees outside, as cold as it got in this part of the world. And he was out there—
Stop it.
He’s all right. He’s just hiding somewhere, sitting someplace where it’s warm and dry—
Thinking about why his mom didn’t recognize him, wondering why his daddy hadn’t told him the truth.
“Hang on, Bretster,” Liam whispered aloud. His hands were curled so tightly around the steering wheel, he wouldn’t have been surprised to see ten indentations when he let go. He leaned forward, peering through the obscured windshield. It was snowing so hard now, the wipers were having trouble keeping up.
The highway was empty, just as the medical building parking lot had been. Liam had wasted precious minutes searching the hospital—he’d been unable to believe that Bret would leave—but eventually he’d been forced to accept the fact that his son had been so hurt and afraid that he’d run. Without thinking, probably without even
feeling the stinging bite of cold as he pushed through the double doors.
At first, anyway.
By now Bret would be freezing. He’d run off without his coat.
The car phone rang.
Liam’s heart skipped a beat as he punched the “Send” button. “Did you find him?” he asked whoever was calling.
“No. ” It was Jacey’s soft, quavering voice. “Everyone is looking, though. Grandma’s at home, waiting for a call. I’m waiting at the hospital, in case he comes back here. I thought—”
“I know, honey, but we’d better stay off the line. ”
“Dad?” She paused, and he knew everything she was feeling. “I’m sorry. ”
“It’s not your fault. It’s mine. I should have told you guys the truth. We’ll talk about it later, okay? When … we’ve got him home safely. ”
“Yeah. When he’s home. ”
Disconnecting the line, he focused on the road again. He had to do that, focus on ordinary things—the road, the streetlights, the hiding places along the way—because when he did that, he kept himself together.
He cut the enormity of his fear into little pieces. Details. These he could handle.
He slowed the car speed, from eight miles per hour to five. He had gone less than a quarter of a mile from the hospital. The distance to town stretched out before him, an endless, twisting path of darkness.
Details.
He forced his gaze to the right, into the black fields along the side of the highway. Bret wouldn’t have crossed the road; he knew better than that. Liam was certain. His son wouldn’t cross the road at night alone … but would he take a ride with a stranger?
Liam suppressed a horrified shudder. Please tell me he learned that rule.
The temperature gauge indicated that, outside, it had dropped another degree.
Liam concentrated on the little things—his foot on the gas, his hands on the wheel, his gaze on the side of the road, where there were no footprints. Just a layer of newfallen snow.
Up ahead, on the right side of the road, the county fairgrounds were a cluster of big metal buildings, barns, arenas, and pavilions. The barn was awash in light; it stood out like a beacon against the blackness all around it.
The lights were on … in the middle of a winter’s night.
Liam felt an electrifying strand of hope. It was one of Mike’s favorite places, that barn. She and Jacey had spent countless summer days there for horse shows and county fairs and riding clinics. Only a few months ago, Bret had earned his first 4-H ribbon there.
At the turnoff, he slowed. Perspiration itched across his brow, turned his hands cold and slick.
Any wrong choice would hurt. He glanced at the temperature gauge again; it was holding steady at twenty-nine. He turned onto the road and floored the accelerator. The wheels screeched for a second before grabbing hold. He sped down the bumpy road, his face pressed so close to the windshield that his nose was almost touching glass. In the parking lot, he slammed on the brakes. The car fishtailed, then came to a shuddering stop.