Tomorrow’s a new beginning...

When a digitally aged photo of a girl named Hope Lawson is posted online, Bailey Smith can’t deny the similarity to herself. But could she really be the same woman who was abducted as a child twenty-three years ago?

When she meets Detective Seth Chandler, who opened the cold case of Hope’s disappearance, suddenly everything changes. Not only does Bailey have a family she barely remembers—and a sister she’s never met—she’s connecting with a man for the first time. A man who’s loving and gentle. But Bailey’s not sure she’s ready to be found: by him or the parents she once lost.

Detective Chandler’s expression never changed.

But Bailey wasn’t surprised that his pupils had dilated when he finally lifted his head. They stared at each other, and she thought, Don’t let him want me. It would be incredibly unrewarding for him. Men...well...she didn’t do men. Not anymore.

When she looked at him again, his crooked smile sent a jolt through her.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Hope Lawson,” he said.

“Just...don’t call me that.”

“All right.” There was that astonishing gentleness again. “Bailey it is. Unless you prefer Ms. Smith?”

“Either is fine.” She retreated to her side of the table. “Thank you, Detective.”

“If you’re going to be Bailey, I’ll be Seth.”

The flutter in her belly wouldn’t let her respond to that. We’re not friends, she wanted to say, but she didn’t want to alienate him, either.

This desire to cling to him was completely unfamiliar to her.

Dear Reader,

You see the articles about girls or women rescued after being held captive for months or years. There’ll be occasional follow-ups that include photos in which she is now stylish and remarkably poised.

Studying them, you’d never guess what she endured. But on the inside, I doubt she is anywhere near as together as she appears. I can imagine many excellent reasons for her to develop a facade to hide the damage she still feels.

But as I contemplated this story idea, I started thinking about an adoptive sister who was always aware her role was to substitute for the “real” daughter who had been abducted and was still mourned by their mutual parents. And what about Hope Lawson, who finds her way home after twenty-three years to discover her parents replaced her with another little girl, whom she is now supposed to call sister?

What a cauldron of family conflict on top of deep emotional scarring!

The heroes? Not hard to figure out for each of these sisters what man would both draw and threaten her on an emotional level.

Minor confession: sometimes I’m a little ashamed of myself, being intrigued by such painful experiences. I mean—romance writer here.

But I tell myself a love story isn’t really about the romantic stuff, it’s about the terror of making an awful mistake, about being hurt and healed and ultimately believing in another person.

I hope you find Hope aka Bailey’s miraculous homecoming moving, and will be on board for Eve’s story in my October Superromance, In Hope’s Shadow.

Janice

Yesterday’s Gone

Janice Kay Johnson

www.millsandboon.co.uk

An author of more than eighty books for children and adults, USA TODAY bestselling author JANICE KAY JOHNSON is especially well-known for her Mills & Boon Superromance novels about love and family, about the way generations connect and the power our earliest experiences have on us throughout life. Her 2007 novel Snowbound won a RITA® Award from Romance Writers of America for Best Contemporary Series Romance. A former librarian, Janice raised two daughters in a small rural town north of Seattle, Washington. She loves to read and is an active volunteer and board member for Purrfect Pals, a no-kill cat shelter. Visit her online at janicekayjohnson.com.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Extract

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

DETECTIVE SETH CHANDLER tugged his tie loose and undid the top button of his white shirt as he settled into his chair. Testifying in court that morning had demanded his best getup.

Unfortunately, the detective bull pen was upstairs in the aging building that housed the county sheriff’s department. In winter, they appreciated the scientific fact that heat rises. A heat wave right before the Fourth of July weekend meant today they sweated, as they would off and on all summer. A couple of window air-conditioning units rattled away inadequately. Doing the job meant tuning out physical discomfort along with the noise of too many conversations around him.

No surprise to find that, in his absence, over a hundred new emails had arrived. He was being inundated with “tips” right now. That’s the way it was when you got word out there. Most were worthless, but once in a while, he found wheat among the chaff.

Within moments, he was engrossed. He skimmed, deleted, opened the next.

I saw this feature online about missing kids and how you can draw pictures so everyone can see what they look like once they grow up. One of them looks EXACTLY like this girl I knew in high school.

His phone rang. He gave it an irritated glance and saw the call was internal, which meant he couldn’t ignore it.

Attention still on the open email, he snatched up the phone. “Chandler.”

I bet she is the one you’re looking for. Her name wasn’t Hope, but I’m totally positive. Except you’ve got her hair wrong in the picture, and her nose, too.

“A Mrs. Lawson is here to see you,” said the desk sergeant. Seth heard a murmur in the background. “Karen Lawson,” the sergeant amended.

“Buzz her in.”

Most police departments across the nation had grown cautious. Locked doors kept visitors from barging in to confront an officer.

Seth rose to his feet a minute later when the door opened and a slender, middle-aged woman, who reminded him a little too much of his mother, appeared. It wasn’t the general physical similarities that had him making the comparison, but rather the sorrow that clung inescapably to both women.

Clutching her purse, Mrs. Lawson cast a shy look at the men and women too engrossed in phone calls and computers to so much as notice her presence. She wound her way between desks, her expression apologetic when she reached him, even though this wasn’t her first visit and wouldn’t be her last. He made a real effort to call and let the Lawsons know what he was doing, but she’d obviously read advice to families of missing children that told her to be persistent. Never let them give up, the advocates often advised.

Ironic, in this instance, when he was the one who had taken the initiative to revisit a case so cold, he’d had to defrost it.

She rushed into speech. “I know I shouldn’t be bothering you, Detective, but Kirk asked last night if I’d heard from you and since I happened to be downtown I thought you might not mind...”

He interrupted. “Of course I don’t mind. Please, sit down.”

She perched on the straight-backed chair next to his desk, her blue eyes fixed anxiously on him. Damn it, he was disturbed every time he saw her by the resemblance the age-progressed drawing of her long-missing daughter had to her. There was a reason for that, of course; part of the art of age progression was using photographs of the parents as children and adults. And there was no denying that daughters did sometimes grow up to look like their mothers.

“I’m getting a lot of calls and emails,” he said gently, “but nothing has jumped out at me yet. I can tell you that the photo of Hope at six years old and the artist’s best guess at what she’d look like now have been getting wide currency. It’s prompted some newspapers to run features on the fate of missing children like her, but I’m especially hopeful because those pictures are appearing everywhere on the internet. People are intrigued.” It was the pretty young white woman syndrome, of course, but he’d use anything that worked. “Given her age now—” assuming Hope Lawson had lived to grow up, of course, which they both knew to be unlikely in the extreme “—odds are she and her friends spend a lot of time on social media sites. If she’s alive, I’m optimistic that, sooner or later, someone will recognize her.”

God, he hoped he wasn’t giving this woman false hope. He suppressed his natural wince at his choice of word, as he too often had to these days. What a name for a kid who’d been abducted!

“Thank you,” she murmured, and he knew damn well she hadn’t even heard the “if she’s alive” part. He’d been deluding himself that they both knew her daughter was likely dead.

From the beginning, he’d made it clear that he was fighting the odds here. Hope Lawson had vanished without a trace twenty-three years ago. The 99.9 percent likelihood: she was dead. He’d set out to take advantage of improved police and medical examiner cooperation to find a match with an unclaimed body. Elizabeth Smart and Jaycee Dugard were the rarities, not the norm. But despite all his warnings, Karen Lawson wanted to believe that by some miracle he’d bring her daughter home alive and well.

A sheriff’s department in a rural county like this one didn’t have anything like a cold case squad. He was allowed to indulge his interest as time allowed, however. He’d found closure for a few people, mostly by giving them a chance to put a headstone on a loved one’s grave. Not a happy ending, but better than suffering through a lifetime of wondering, as Karen and Kirk Lawson had.

Her gaze left him to fall on his bulletin board, where he’d tacked copies of the last school picture taken of little Hope Lawson and of the recent rendering. Other photos shared the space: a sweetly pretty wife and mother who had either suffered a terrible fate or fled from her husband and preschool-age children two years before; a toddler who’d disappeared from a picnic ground the previous summer; an elderly man with the beginnings of dementia who had gone for a walk and never come home.

If only to himself, Seth would admit that his gaze was most often drawn to Hope Lawson’s face. As a child, huge blue eyes had dominated a thin face with high, sharp cheekbones. A few pale freckles dusted a small nose. Moonlight-pale bangs cut straight across her forehead. Her grin revealed a missing tooth.

The artist had seen the promise of beauty in her, or something very like. The cheekbones were distinctive. More than anything, they gave him hope that she would be recognized.

Hope. Damn.

“Eve mentioned that she hasn’t seen you recently,” Mrs. Lawson remarked.

Another wince he didn’t let show. The Lawsons’ adopted daughter was responsible for his current cold case project. They’d been on several dates when she told him something of her family’s history. Intrigued, he’d done his research, gone to talk to her parents and made the decision to do his damnedest to find out what had happened to the little girl who disappeared sometime between getting out of the community pool after a summer swimming lesson and her mother arriving to pick her up.

He’d quickly got the idea Eve wished she’d never told him about Hope. She wouldn’t talk about the missing “sister” she’d never met, much less how she felt about her adoptive parents’ renewed yearning for their biological daughter. Any conflicted feelings she might have were understandable. Seth didn’t see any chance of the relationship going anywhere long-term, but she was an attractive woman and he liked her. No one else had caught his eye recently. Why not call and find out if she’d like to have dinner this weekend?

“I’ve been working long hours,” he told her mother, feeling guilty even though it was the truth. Among other things, he’d been working a murder/suicide perplexing enough to draw nationwide attention. There was no one to arrest after that bloodbath, but everyone would feel better if he could come up with some answers to explain the unexplainable.

In fact, he’d barely had time to keep up with the influx of emails he was receiving in response to his multiple postings of Hope Lawson’s story.

“Then I won’t keep you,” Mrs. Lawson said with dignity, rising to her feet. “I really shouldn’t have come by. I know if there was any news, you’d have called.”

“I would,” he said gently, standing, as well. “But I don’t mind you stopping by, either.”

She searched his face, then gave a small nod. “Good day, Detective Chandler.”

He stayed where he was and watched until she let herself out into the hall and was gone.

“You’ll never get rid of that one,” observed the detective whose desk was right behind Seth’s.

He grunted. “Am I doing her any favors? Hell, face it. It’s an intellectual exercise for me. For her...”

“It’s a heartbreaker.”

He turned to scowl at Ben Kemper, near his age, light-haired to his dark, a man Seth suspected was on a mission of his own, although Seth had no idea what it was. “Thanks. Just what I needed to hear.”

Kemper grinned. “An intellectual exercise, huh? That’s all it was?”

“Damn it, no! But I don’t have the same stake that woman does, either.” He scrubbed a hand over his head. “Shit. My best hope was a match in NamUs.” The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System hadn’t existed when Hope Lawson disappeared. A body found in one jurisdiction had in the past rarely been matched to a listing for a missing person even a few counties away. Now medical examiners, cops, even families could input information. A body found in a shallow grave in Florida could be linked to a woman snatched in Montana. As time allowed, some medical examiners’ offices were inputting old information. Or the improvements in DNA technology meant they were taking another try at finding a name for a body long since buried but never identified.

“Nothing, huh?” Kemper leaned back in his chair, his expression sympathetic.

“No.” He didn’t kid himself that meant Hope Lawson had grown up and was living out there somewhere under another name.

Kemper was the one to grunt this time. “You get a call back from Cassie Sparks’s school counselor?”

He and Kemper, often paired on the job, were working the murder/suicide together. Along with her mother, eleven-year-old Cassie had been shot to death by her father, who had then swallowed the gun. The fact he’d killed a kid—his own kid—had made the scene a difficult one, even for seasoned cops.

“Hell. No.” Seth frowned. “I’ll finish going through these emails, then head out to the school. I should still be able to catch her before they let out.” They were trying to find out every detail of the lives of all three members of the Sparks family. Unfortunately, Cassie’s very basic Facebook page had been unrevealing. Friends were denying any knowledge of problems with her dad. “You talk to the father’s boss again?” he asked.

“Sure. Best employee ever. Great attitude. We have to be wrong. Dale would never do anything like this.”

They’d been getting a lot of that. Too much, in Seth’s no-doubt cynical viewpoint, one shared by his fellow detective. No one who’d known the Sparks family wanted to admit they’d seen any crack in the perfect facade. It sucked to face the reality that you might have knowingly blinded yourself. Or to realize you weren’t nearly as perceptive as you’d imagined yourself to be.

“I hear a few of his coworkers have a favorite bar,” Ben continued. “I figure I’ll stop by tonight, see what they have to say after a couple of beers.”

Seth nodded. “Good.” He turned back to his monitor and skimmed down to where he’d left off on that last email.

Except you’ve got her hair wrong in the picture, and her nose, too. And her chin is kind of square, not pointy like that.

Uh-huh, he thought. But she was totally positive they had a match.

Delete.

Twenty minutes later, he logged out and pushed his chair back. “I’m off.”

Ben had a phone tucked between his ear and shoulder as he tapped away on his keyboard. He glanced up. “You coming back?”

“Probably not. I need to knock on some more doors in the Garcias’ neighborhood.” Raul and Maria had come home after a hard day’s work to find their brand-new Sony fifty-five-inch LED HDTV missing, along with the Dell Inspiron laptop the grandparents had bought the granddaughter just last week to take with her to college. Seth had little doubt the thief knew one of the Garcias. He had to have heard about one or both of those very nice purchases—the TV had a two-thousand-dollar-plus price tag. Otherwise, why had their house been hit when none of the others in their modest neighborhood had been?

Yesterday, people had been at work. He figured by the time he got there now, everyone would be reaching home. A kid might have said something to a parent about the guy she saw knocking on the Garcias’ door, then going around back. You never knew.

With a last look at the bulletin board, he thought, Too much to do, not enough time to do it.

And then, Damn, I’ve got to call Eve.

* * *

BAILEY SMITH PAUSED by one of her tables. “How’s your meal? Can I get you anything else?”

The guy, hot in an I-know-I-am way, was so engrossed in something on his smartphone, he didn’t even look up. The girl did, even though her phone sat next to her plate, too.

Canosa was a high-end Italian restaurant only a few blocks from the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood. This couple’s dinner along with their drinks and the bottle of wine would run them a couple hundred dollars. What Bailey couldn’t figure out was why they hadn’t eaten at home or hit the drive-through at McDonald’s if they didn’t intend to so much as look at each other or have a conversation over the meal.

But, hey. As long as they tipped generously, why should she care?

“It was awesome,” the girl said in a bored tone. “Actually, we’re probably ready for our check.”

Bailey smiled. “I’ll get it for you.”

She paused at one other table, then went to the computer station tucked into an alcove by the kitchen and ran off the bill for table six. She glanced over it for accuracy, then smilingly placed it on the table midway between the two. The guy reached for it.

The girl said, “You know, I keep thinking you look familiar.”

“Well, if you’ve eaten here before...”

“No, friends told us it was good. You don’t work at Warner Brothers, do you?”

Um, no, she wanted to say. I work at Canosa. But really that wasn’t fair. Living expenses were high in Southern California. She knew people who worked a part-time job or even two on top of a full-time one just to pay the rent.

“Afraid not,” she said cheerfully. If the girl had looked even faintly familiar to her, she might have mentioned being a student at the University of Southern California, but, honestly, she didn’t care if they might have crossed paths before.

The guy handed her an American Express card. She took it with another smile.

When she returned to the table, it was to find them both staring at her.

“I figured it out,” said the girl, a stylish brunette whose handbag was either a genuine Fendi or an amazing knockoff. She sounded excited. “I saw your picture on, I don’t remember, Facebook or Tumblr or someplace like that.”

“Couldn’t have been me,” Bailey assured her. “I’m not a celebrity in disguise here.”

“No, it was amazing! Everybody has been passing it around. It was about this little girl who disappeared and an artist drew what she’d look like now. And...wow. I’d swear it’s you.”

The darkness inside Bailey rose, dimming her vision for a minute. But she didn’t let her expression change. “Really? That’s weird. Pretty sure I’ve never disappeared.”

“Yes, but you ought to look at it. It’s totally uncanny.”

She managed a laugh. “Okay. What’s my name?”

The young woman frowned. “Hope something.” And then her face brightened. “Lawson. Hope Lawson.”

Oh God, oh God. Could any of this be true?

“I’ll look,” Bailey promised. “Gotta see my doppelgänger.”

They were still looking over their shoulders at her on their way out. She was so engaged in holding herself together, she didn’t even check to see what kind of tip they’d left. She had another hour before she could leave.

Part of the act of maintaining was convincing herself she wasn’t going to bother to look at the totally uncanny picture that supposedly looked like her. It probably really didn’t. And if it did? Why would she care? Nothing would ever make her Hope Lawson, even if by some bizarre chance that had been her name. Hope. She almost snorted. How sweet.

Long after she collected her tips for the shift, as well as her paycheck, and went out to her car, dying to take off her very high heels even if it mean driving home with bare feet, she stayed in the mode that could be summed up as No Way. There’d been a time she would have given anything to be found, to have it turn out she had a perfect family somewhere who would welcome her back with cries of joy and who’d kept her bedroom exactly the way it was when she disappeared. Then, she’d imagined it as very pink, with a canopy bed. Every so often, she made alterations in what that perfect little girl’s bedroom would look like, but the canopy bed always stayed.

By the time she was thirteen or fourteen, though, she realized she didn’t belong in that bedroom, and the family wouldn’t want the girl she was now back anyway. Not long after that, she quit believing they even existed.

Now—was she really supposed to open herself to the possibility they actually did? That they were still looking for her? The idea would be ludicrous, except she’d occasionally, just out of curiosity, scanned websites focused on missing persons and seen the kind of age-progressed pictures the girl tonight had talked about. She’d read a little about how it was done, combining knowledge of how a face normally changed with age—what thickened or sagged or whatever—along with details of how that child’s parents’ faces had changed as they grew up, to achieve an approximation that was sometimes astonishingly accurate.

As she turned onto West Sunset Boulevard, she thought, it might be interesting to take a look. And then she could dismiss the whole silly idea, instead of leaving it to fester. Which it would. She knew herself that well.

Besides, if anyone else mentioned it, she could say, Saw it—definitely not me.

She hated that her apartment house didn’t have gated parking, but that was one of those things you had to pay for. And she did, at least, have an assigned spot underneath the aging, three-story apartment house, so she didn’t have to hike a block or more when she got in late. Even so, she had to put her heels back on, because she knew all too well what she might step in—yuck. She took her usual careful look around when she got out and locked her car. Her handbag was heavy enough to qualify as a weapon, and she held it at the ready as she hustled for the door that let in to the shabby lobby and single, slow-moving elevator.

Safely inside, she ignored the guy who was getting mail from his box. He had a key to it, so he must actually live here, too. He didn’t make any effort to get in the elevator with her, which she appreciated.

There were only four apartments on each floor. She let herself into hers, turned both locks and put the chain on, then groaned and kicked off her shoes again. It sucked to have a job that required torturing herself like this, but sexy paid when it came to tips.

Her laptop sat open on her desk where she’d left it. She didn’t let herself so much as glance at it, instead shedding clothes on her way to the bathroom, where she changed into the knit pj shorts and thin tank top she slept in at this time of year. Then she used cold cream to remove her makeup, brushed her teeth and stared at herself in the mirror. The light in here was merciless. She leaned in closer, the counter edge digging into her hip bones, and made a variety of faces at herself. It wasn’t as if she was so distinctive looking.

But she knew that was a lie. She kind of was. Her cheekbones were prominent, almost like wings, her chin pointed, her forehead high enough she had her hair cut with feathered bangs to partly conceal it. Without makeup, her face was ridiculously colorless, given that her eyebrows weren’t much darker than her ash-blond hair, and her eyes were a sort of slate blue. She looked young like this, more like the girl she didn’t want to remember being. The one who had been invisible when she desperately wished someone would see her.

“Fine,” she said aloud. “Just do it. Then you’ll know.”

While her laptop booted, she turned on the air-conditioning unit even though she tried not to use it any more than she could, but today had been hot.

Then she perched on her cheap rolling desk chair, went online and, in the search field, typed Hope Lawson.

* * *

A MONTH LATER, Seth admitted, if only to himself, that he’d done everything he could think of to do to bring resolution to the Lawsons.

He had interviewed witnesses afresh, at least those who could still be found. He’d talked to the first responding officer and the investigator who’d pursued the case thereafter. He had tracked down neighbors of the Lawsons’, even those who had since moved. Hope’s teacher that year. He’d studied investigations and arrests made anywhere around the time of Hope’s disappearance, looking for parallels no one else had noticed. He’d read every scrap of paper in the box he recovered from the storage room in the basement.

Meantime, he’d made sure her DNA and a copy of her dental X-ray were entered in every available database, along with the two photos. He’d worked social media sites to the best of his ability.

The result? Something like a thousand emails, not one of which pinged. His best guess was that Hope had been raped and killed within hours of her abduction, and her bones were buried somewhere in the wooded, mountainous area bordering Puget Sound in northwest Washington state. Maybe those bones would be found someday, but given the vast stretches of National Forest and National Park as well as floodplain that would never be farmed, it was entirely possible no one would ever stumble on them.

Sitting at his desk, he grimaced. He owed the Lawsons a phone call. If he didn’t get on it, Karen Lawson would pop up, sure as hell, apologizing but still expecting an explanation of what he’d done this week to find her missing daughter.

And, if he was honest, he’d have to say, Nothing. I’ve done everything I can. I’m sorry.

If he was blunt, would she accept his failure and go away?

“Nope,” Kemper said behind him. “Not happening.”

“What?” He swiveled in his chair.

“You were talking to yourself. You asked—I answered.”

He swore. Good to know he’d taken to speaking his every thought aloud. Was he talking in his sleep, too? Wouldn’t be a surprise. He’d been having a lot of nightmares lately, too many populated by Hope. In the latest unnerving incarnation, she was a ghost. Sometimes a little girl, sometimes a woman, always translucent. Either way, he couldn’t touch her, couldn’t escape her no matter what he did.

The idea had apparently sparked his unconscious imagination—hey, pun! and not in a good way—because Cassie Sparks’s ghost had joined Hope last night. She’d seemed kind of protective of little Hope.

Hard to imagine, considering her dark path, which had turned out to be even uglier than they had known when they found her body along with her parents’. He and Ben had discovered what precipitated that hideous final scene, and part of him wished they hadn’t.

Shifting his thoughts back to Mrs. Lawson, he said gloomily, “She brought me cookies last week.”

Ben’s mouth quirked. “And they were good. Peanut butter cookies are my favorite.”

“She brings pictures, too.” He yanked open his center desk drawer and brandished the small pile. The one on top, the most recent, was a baby picture. First smile, someone had written on the back.

Radiant, open, delighted, it was unbearable to look at when he knew that baby’s fate. He’d shoved it into the drawer the minute Mrs. Lawson walked away. Angry at her unsubtle emotional manipulation, he wanted to throw them in the trash. Because he saw her pain, week in and week out, he didn’t.

His phone rang and he turned back around, reaching for it.

“Someone here to see you,” the desk sergeant said, his tone odd. “Her name is, uh, Bailey Smith.”

“Never heard of her. She say what she want?”

“To talk about Hope Lawson.”

Seth sighed. She looks EXACTLY like this girl I know, except...well, for her nose, chin, cheeks and eyes.

“Conference room empty?” he asked.

“Yes, Detective.”

“I’ll be right down.”

Ben had gone back to whatever he was doing, and no one else paid any attention as Seth walked out and took the stairs.

He emerged through the heavy, bulletproof door that led to the desk sergeant’s domain behind the counter, beyond which was the waiting room. As usual, half a dozen people slumped in seats, some sullen, some anxious. One woman stood, her back to him—and a very nice back it was. Interested, he enjoyed taking a good look. She was midheight, slender, with a tight, perfect ass and fine legs. Chinos cut off just below her knees bared smooth calves. One foot tapped, either from nerves or impatience. Nice foot, too, he thought idly; since she wore rubber flip-flops, he could see toenails painted grass green with some tiny decoration he couldn’t make out centered on each nail.

He lifted his gaze to her hair, bundled up and clipped on the back of her head. It was so pale a blond, at first sight he thought dyed, except it had some natural-looking striations of color in it.

Something inside him went still.

“Detective,” the desk sergeant said in an urgent undertone.

As if hearing his low voice, the woman turned to face the two men, pointed chin held defiantly.

Stunned, Seth couldn’t move, couldn’t speak.

Couldn’t breathe.

She was alive. And...damn. How could the artist possibly have got it so right?

CHAPTER TWO

THE MAN STARING at her in open shock was not quite what Bailey had expected, although she didn’t know why that was. She’d looked him up online and even found a newspaper photo of him taken as he left the scene of a recent, really horrible crime.

The coloring was the same—dark hair, worn a little longer than she thought cops usually did. Brown eyes. Broad-shouldered, solid build. She had been reassured by a hint of bleakness the photographer had captured on that hard face. He must be human, she had thought, although, really, she knew it wasn’t as if he mattered at all. If it turned out she really was this Hope person, he’d introduce her to her supposed parents, hold a press conference and bask in his victory as he sailed off to meet new challenges, while she was left to grapple with what, if anything, this meant.

Now, seeing the expression on his face, she felt like a fish in a very small glass bowl. She suddenly, desperately wanted not to be here. It was too much. He cared too much, she thought in panic. Why?

She slid one foot back, then the other. The door wasn’t that far. If she took off, what were they going to do? Arrest her?

Seemingly galvanized into motion, he pushed through the waist-high, swinging door. “Ms. Lars— Smith,” he corrected himself. “Please. You’ve come this far. I’d really like to talk to you.”

Only a few feet away from her now, he was even more intimidating. Something in him seemed to reach out and grab her. Her feet refused to keep edging backward. It was as if they were stuck in some gluey substance.

“I shouldn’t have come,” she blurted.

He shook his head. “You need answers, don’t you?” he told her more than asked, in a deep, soothing voice.

Maybe. Yes. She did want answers, just not the complications that would come with them. She didn’t relate well to people on any but a superficial level. Whatever it was she saw boiling inside him scared her.

She did some deep breathing, not taking her gaze from him, feeling him as a threat on some level she didn’t understand. Stupid.

“Yes. All right. I’ll talk to you. That’s why I’m here.”

“Good.” He produced a smile gentler than she would have imagined him capable of. “There’s a small conference room back here. We can talk there.” He stepped back and gestured toward the swinging door that led behind the long counter.

She studied it warily, then the police officer behind the counter who had also been watching her. Finally she pretended a confidence she didn’t feel and walked forward.

Although Detective Chandler followed, he kept a certain distance between them she appreciated. She was afraid she’d given away her irrational panic, and that scared her. If she had one skill in life, it was an ability to hide all the craziness she carried inside.

She hesitated until he waved her toward a hallway, and then she stepped back while he opened the first door, glass-paned to allow passersby to look in.

“Please, have a seat,” he said.

She took the first chair, the closest to the door. It also offered the advantage that nobody going by could see her face.

He circled the table and sat across from her, then did nothing but look at her for long enough to have her fidgeting. Finally, he gave his head a faint, incredulous shake.

“I assume you’re here because you saw the picture,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Just out of curiosity, where did you come across it? Were you searching for information about your background?”

“No,” Bailey said flatly. “A total stranger thought she knew me, then remembered a story she’d seen online about this little girl who was abducted. She said someone had come up with a picture of what that little girl would look like now, and I was right on.”

He winced.

She raised her eyebrows. “What?”

“You have no idea how many times I’ve read or heard that these past several months. Except usually they say we got the nose or the chin or the eyes wrong.” The shock in his eyes was back. “We didn’t.”

Much as she’d like to, she couldn’t deny that.

“So, you went online to see if this total stranger was right,” he prompted.

“I did.”

“And made the decision to come to Stimson.”

“Actually,” she said coolly, “that was a month ago. In fact, I made the decision to pretend I’d never seen it. It’s been a very long time since I’ve had any interest in finding out where I came from.”

Instead of appearing shocked or disapproving, he studied her with interest. “You didn’t believe anyone out there cared.”

“No, I didn’t.” Her usual breezy persona was failing her. She was coming across as hard. No, brittle. Probably unlikable. Yeah, so what? I am unlikable. “Let’s be honest, Detective. Even if you run a DNA test and it’s a match to Hope Lawson, I am not her.” She leaned forward, her gaze boring into his, her voice rising despite herself. “Do you understand? I can’t be her. I don’t intend even to try.”

He raised dark eyebrows. “And yet you’re here.”

And there was the conundrum.

“I suppose, in the end, curiosity got to me. Also...” She frowned. This was the part she didn’t understand. She thought of herself as utterly self-centered. Life hadn’t taught her to be anything else.

“Also?” he prodded, that deep voice now easygoing, undemanding. He was going out of his way not to put pressure on her, because he’d read her with unerring accuracy.

“I suppose I thought it might mean something to these people. I mean, if they’re still searching for—” Oops. She’d almost said me. “Hope,” she substituted.

“Never knowing what happened to someone you love is incredibly hard.” That sounded personal, as if he had lost a loved one. “Worse than seeing her murdered. Worse than burying her. Actually seeing you, knowing you are alive and well, will mean everything to the Lawsons.”

“You’re assuming I am Hope.” She made it a challenge.

“We’ll definitely run a DNA test, if you’re willing.” He waited for her nod. “Unfortunately, dental records won’t be helpful. At the time of your disappearance, you were only beginning to get your first adult teeth. However, Hope did have a birthmark.”

Bailey flinched. She hadn’t seen mention of that.

“It’s a small detail held back after your disappearance. DNA matching was then in its infancy.”

She nodded. He waited. Finally she sighed. “I have one on my left hip. It’s...sort of heart shaped.”

“May I see it?”

“Here?”

“Why not?”

He was right. She certainly wasn’t a shrinking virgin. After a moment, she stood, went around the table, unbuttoned and unzipped her chinos, and pushed them down enough to reveal the waistband of her panties—and the tiny, dark heart that always intrigued guys and disturbed her. She used to wonder if it was a brand he had put on her.

Detective Chandler looked for a moment that stretched and had her heart beating hard and fast. His expression never changed—but she also wasn’t surprised to see that his pupils had dilated when he finally lifted his head. They stared at each other, and she thought, Don’t let him want me. Because she was tempted? No, no, no. Because it would be incredibly unrewarding for him. Men...well, she didn’t do men. Not anymore.

She fumbled hastily to fasten her chinos. When she looked at him again, his crooked smile sent a jolt through her.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Hope Lawson,” he said.

“Just...don’t call me that.”

“All right.” There was that astonishing gentleness again. “Bailey it is. Unless you prefer Ms. Smith?”

“Either is fine.” She retreated to her side of the table. “Thank you, Detective.”

“If you’re going to be Bailey, I’ll be Seth.”

The flutter in her belly wouldn’t let her respond to that. We’re not friends, she wanted to say, but she didn’t want to alienate him, either. This desire to cling to him was completely unfamiliar to her.

“Can you tell me what you remember?” he asked.

She had known he would ask but had hoped for a reprieve. Still, maybe it was better to get this over with.

“If you mean about this town or the Lawsons or...” She stopped. “Nothing. I think he punished me if I asked questions or said anything about...about home. So I forgot. He made me call him Daddy.”

Seth Chandler’s face hardened. “He’s the one who snatched you.”

“I think so.” She’d blocked out so much. “He might have gotten me from someone else. I’m not positive.”

“But he kept you, this man.”

“For a while. I don’t know how old I was for sure, but I think about eleven when he ditched me.”

“Ditched you?”

“We moved a lot.” She did remember that. “Stayed in crummy places. Sometimes he’d get an apartment, sometimes it was those motels that rent rooms by the week. You know.”

He nodded. She saw that much, although she could no longer meet his eyes. The police and then social workers had dragged some of this out of her back then, but she hadn’t told them everything, out of fear or loyalty, she didn’t know which.

“It was a really scuzzy motel that time. In, um, Bakersfield. California,” she added, in case he didn’t know. “It was night. He said he was going out. He did that a lot.” And she’d been relieved. Maybe he wouldn’t wake her up when he came in. “Only this time, he never came back. When he wasn’t there in the morning, I realized he had taken my stuff into the room but not his. He meant to leave me.”

A shudder passed through Seth—no, Detective Chandler. His hand that rested on the table knotted into a fist so tight, his knuckles showed white. Bailey eyed that fist, knowing it should frighten her and wondering why it didn’t.

What was truly remarkable, considering the rage vibrating in him, was the kindness in his voice. “What did you do?”

“I waited. I don’t know, two or three days, I think. If he came back and I was gone, he’d have been furious. I sneaked out a few times and stole some food. There was a Burger King a couple of blocks away. If you sort of lurk in a place like that, people throw food away, or they just leave it on the table. Eventually, the motel manager let himself into the room because he hadn’t paid. That’s when the police came.”

“Did they try to find out who you were?”

“I don’t know,” she said uncertainly. “I said he was my daddy, and I think they believed that. I know they looked for him, but he was gone. So I went into foster care.” She shrugged. Habit. A way of saying, No biggie, that’s the way it was.

“Why do you think he left you then?”

She looked down at her hands. “I think because my body was changing. He didn’t like that.”

“He used you sexually.” Detective Chandler sounded almost calm.

Bailey flashed a dark, scathing look at him. “What do you think?”

He closed his eyes. Tendons stood out in his neck and a nerve pulsed in his jaw. She waited while he fought for control.

Finally he looked at her with eyes that were almost black. “I’d like to get my hands on him.”

Surprised, she said, “That was a very long time ago. You didn’t know me.”

“I feel like I did. I’ve immersed myself in your life. In that day. What everyone did, said, thought. The child you were is very real to me.”

“I’m glad she is to one of us,” Bailey joked.

His eyes narrowed a flicker, as if she’d startled or even shocked him.

“That girl is a complete stranger to me,” she explained. “It’s why I wasn’t sure I wanted to make this pilgrimage.” Her word choice caught her by surprise. Was that how she saw this?

“I understand, although it’s going to be hard on the Lawsons.”

“I can’t help that.”

He nodded. “Are you ready to meet them?”

She had a feeling he’d been about to say “your parents,” and appreciated the fact that he didn’t. Parents... Well, there was an unreal concept.

Hoping her panic wasn’t visible, she asked, “Would they be home at this time of day?”

He glanced at his watch. “I don’t know, but we can find out.”

Bailey almost begged him to give her time. Maybe this evening, she could say. Or tomorrow. Tomorrow sounded even better. But she guessed he wouldn’t let her out of his sight if he could help it. He suspected her of wanting to bolt, she knew.

And, oh, he had no idea how much she did want to.

“You’re so sure?”

His eyebrows rose again. “That you’re Hope? Yeah, I am. They had a photo of you naked in one of those little kid pools. You were maybe two. Investigators had it blown up because the birthmark was visible.”

After a moment, she nodded.

“I’ll remind the Lawsons that DNA confirmation is still a good idea, but that could take weeks. It would be cruel to leave them in the dark. They’ve been waiting for this moment for a very long time.”

She nodded, wringing her hands beneath the table where he couldn’t see. “First, will you tell me something about them?”

“Of course I will. I’m sorry. I should have thought of that. Kirk owns an auto body shop and tow truck. He’s a quiet man. I don’t know how much of that has to do with what happened to you, or if he always was. Your mother—Karen—was a schoolteacher. She quit to devote herself full-time to hunting for you. Eventually, she started working part-time, but out of the home. She couldn’t work with children, she said. She does machine-quilting.”

Bailey blinked. “That’s a big cut in pay.”

“I get the impression she stays as busy as she wants to.” He hesitated. “Three years after your abduction, they took in a foster daughter and eventually adopted her. Eve is a year younger than you, I believe.”

So they’d tried to replace her. Bailey wondered how that had worked. If she remembered them, she might be hurt, but as it was, nothing he’d said yet had triggered even the smallest of memories.

“It turns out I’m a little younger than I thought I was.” She made a face. “We guessed I was at least twelve when he left me. Because of the way I was developing.”

His gaze flicked to her irritatingly overabundant breasts.

Men always looked. And she never blushed, although—wow—her cheeks definitely felt warm.

“Is Bailey what he called you?” the detective asked.

She shook her head hard. Hard enough her hair clip slipped and she had to reach up to reanchor it. “No. I wouldn’t tell anyone my name. Eventually, they gave up and let me pick my own. I went to court to make it legal once I was an adult.”

“You know I’m going to want to know that name eventually.”

She compressed her mouth.

He took out his phone, his gaze never leaving hers.

* * *

SETH SUCCEEDED IN talking her into riding with him to the Lawsons’. She’d wanted to follow him.

Have her car available for a quick getaway, he suspected.

But she reluctantly got into his department issue unmarked car and deposited a sizable handbag at her feet. He started the engine to get the air-conditioning going, reached for the gearshift, then let his hand drop. He sighed and looked at her.

“You know this isn’t going to be as simple as meeting and greeting the Lawsons, don’t you?”

She eyed him warily. “You mean they’re going to want more from me.”

“They are, but that isn’t what I’m talking about.” He hated to even raise this subject, given how obviously close to panic she already was, but felt he had to. “Your reappearance is going to be big news. The biggest. The press will flock to Stimson. You’ll be on the cover of People magazine. You will give hope to every parent who lost a child who has never been found. It won’t be a nine-day wonder, either. They’ll keep following up.” Seth knew he sounded brutal. “A week from now, a month from now, a year from now, they will want to hear how your family has healed. How you’ve moved on. They’ll dig for all the details. Paparazzi will try to catch you unawares. You will never live an unexamined life again.”

As he’d talked, horror had gradually overtaken her face. “Like Elizabeth Smart.”

“Yes. You, Bailey Smith, will be famous.”

“Oh, God.” She was shaking.

Unable to resist, he took one of her fine-boned hands. “Breathe.”

“I can’t do this.”

“I think you’ve come too far to turn back.”

Blue eyes fastened on his with a desperation that wrenched his heart. “If I go now—”

“Do I leave the Lawsons thinking you’re probably dead?”

“What if I meet them and we don’t tell anyone?” She didn’t seem to have noticed they were holding hands. That she was clutching him.

“I don’t think that would work.”

“Why not? You could make it part of the deal. Say I’ll talk to them only if they agree to keep it private.”

“You have grandparents. Aunts and uncles, cousins. Your parents have friends. Their adopted daughter. I know Karen Lawson. She’s incapable of lying to everyone. She won’t be able to hide her happiness.” He stroked the back of her hand with his thumb. “And then there’s your face, Bailey.”

The way she stared at him, stricken, told him she understood.

“The stranger that pointed you to the picture. Is this the only person who saw it and noticed the resemblance?”

Her shoulders sagged. “No. A couple of others have said something.”

“All it would take is someone getting excited and telling a reporter. Think what a coup it would be. Doing it this way, we have some control over the flow of information. You can give exclusives to reporters who will treat your experience with sensitivity, say ‘No comment’ to everyone else. We’ll hold a press conference, then ask everyone to give you and the Lawsons the privacy you need to come to terms with this new reality.”

He’d always thought the idea of drowning in someone’s eyes was idiotic. Unable to look away from her, he discovered different.

“But...my life,” she whispered.

He had to say this. “Will never be the same.”

“Oh, God,” she said again. Her struggle to regain her balance was visible. “I should never have told you my name. I could have made one up. Then I could dye my hair. Wear colored contacts. I could still do that,” she said on a rising note.

He didn’t say anything.

Defeat flattened her expression. It was a long moment before she nodded. She bowed her head and seemed to notice their linked hands for the first time.

He gently disengaged them, however reluctant he was to sever the connection.

“When you called her, why didn’t you tell Mrs. Lawson you’d found me?” she asked suddenly. “They probably think you’re bringing bad news.”

“Me finding your body wouldn’t have been bad news.” He frowned. “It would have hurt in one way, but been a relief in another. They’d have had closure, at least.”

“I can understand that,” she conceded.

“The answer to your question is, I don’t know.” He heard his own uncertainty. “Maybe I just want to see their faces.” And it could be that was the answer. He’d worked hard to effect this reunion. Usually his greatest reward was to make an arrest, then see the jury foreman step up and say, “Guilty as charged.” He hadn’t been able to wall out Karen Lawson’s pain as effectively as he usually did. Seeing her joy—he needed that.

“Okay.” She sat tensely as he backed out of the slot, then drove across town. The sheriff’s department headquarters was on the outskirts of Stimson, the county seat that still had a population of only thirty-five thousand or so. The Lawsons had never moved from the house they’d lived in when their daughter was snatched. He’d read and knew from experience that was usual. People believed they had to be there when their missing family member magically made his or her way home. There was probably a subconscious fear that, if they weren’t there, everything as much the same as possible, the lost one wouldn’t be able to find them.

He stole glances at Bailey Smith, sitting marble still and almost as pale, staring straight ahead through the windshield. Scared to death and refusing to show it, he diagnosed. She didn’t like giving away what she felt.

And him, he kept watching for every tiny giveaway. His heart had taken up an unnaturally fast rhythm from the minute she turned around and their eyes met. He’d felt as if he’d taken a blow to the chest. Attraction multiplied times a thousand, an unfamiliar hunger to know everything about her, to soothe her fears and heal her wounds, a breathtaking need to protect her—and pounding at him the whole time was terror that she’d walk away before... What?

I can find out whether she might feel the same. Even close to the same.

“Here we are,” he said quietly, pulling to a stop in front of a nice two-story white Colonial-style house with dark green shutters. He was willing to bet the Lawsons had never even considered changing so much as the shade of green on the trim when they repainted. Kirk Lawson’s pickup was in the driveway. Lawson’s Auto Body, it said on the door. So Karen had called him to come home, as Seth had suggested.

Bailey’s head had turned and she stared now at the house where she’d grown up. Her breathing had quickened. She might swear she didn’t remember the house at all, but he wondered.

Seth turned off the engine but sat there, ready to give her all the time she needed. A minute passed. Two. Mercifully, the front door didn’t open and he didn’t see anyone at the front window. Probably they hadn’t heard the car out in front.

“You okay?” he asked at last.

“I...yes.” She drew in a deep breath she probably meant to be steadying. “Yes,” she said again, sounding a little more sure.

“Ready?”

Bailey nodded and reached for the door handle.

He met her on the sidewalk and stayed close on the way to the front door. After ringing the bell, he laid a hand on her back. He’d have sworn she leaned into it, just the slightest bit.

After the deep gong, he heard nothing until the door swung open. It was Kirk who looked through the screen door at him before switching his gaze to Bailey. Utter shock transformed his rugged face. “Dear God in heaven,” he choked out.

“May we come in?” Seth asked.

He pushed open the screen, his gaze devouring Bailey. “Hope?” Then he gave his head a shake. “Come in. Karen!” he bellowed.

They stepped into the living room. His wife appeared from the direction of the kitchen. She was braced for bad news, Seth saw, in the instant before she set eyes on her daughter, resurrected, and came to a stop.

And yes, everything he’d hoped to see blazed forth on her face, making him realize that most lines on it had been formed by grief.

“Hope?” she said tremulously. She took a few steps forward then stopped as if disbelieving. Tears brimmed in her eyes and overflowed. “It is you. It is. Oh, Kirk! Hope is home.”

Seth laid a seemingly casual hand on Bailey’s shoulder. Despite his focus on the two Lawsons, he was attuned to her, not them. Aware of her shock as she saw her mother’s face, so much like her own. Felt when the waves of emotion hit her, as she absorbed the yearning in these strangers’ eyes.

Seth cleared his throat. “I do believe this is Hope. That’s why I brought her to meet you. We will need DNA confirmation. You know that.”

Predictably, Karen shook her head, not looking away from her daughter. “Of course this is Hope.” A smile burst forth despite the tears, and she hurried forward, holding out her hands. “Oh, my dear. Thank God. You don’t know what this means to us.”

Bailey shrank toward Seth. “I...it’s a pleasure to meet you.” She turned her head. “Both of you.”

Karen stopped short of flinging her arms around the alarmed young woman. “Meet us? You don’t remember us?”

“I’m afraid not. I...it’s astonishing how much I look like you.” She sounded stunned. “I... I’ve blocked so much out. I suppose I couldn’t let myself remember.”

“That’s why you never came home. Because you didn’t know where we were.”

Seth squeezed Bailey’s shoulder in reassurance. “Why don’t we sit down?”

“Yes. Oh, yes!” Karen gestured them toward the sofa. “Oh, my dear. This has to be the best day of my life, except possibly when you were born.”

Seth understood the sentiment, but was damn glad Eve wasn’t here to hear it expressed.

Bailey cast him a single, desperate glance as they sat, side by side. He smiled at her, hoping to convey without words that she was doing great.

Hoping. He’d never be able to use any variant of that word again without seeing her in his mind’s eye.

Karen tore her gaze from Bailey long enough to beam at him. “You brought her home. You accomplished a miracle.”

He had. He still felt shell-shocked. He’d found Hope. Or, at least, cast the right lure to draw her home.

Uneasiness stirred, because he knew she didn’t think of this house or this town as home. He hadn’t asked yet where she lived, what her life was like, thinking they had more than enough to deal with. She didn’t wear a ring, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t involved with a man. She could have kids. Who knew?

If she had a guy in her life, where the hell was he? Seth thought savagely. No man who loved her would have let her do this alone.

“Will you...will you tell us about yourself?” Karen said timidly, seemingly still not realizing her face was wet with tears even as it glowed with joy.

Kirk sat heavily in an armchair. Seth had the impression he hadn’t once taken his eyes off Bailey. Both waited expectantly for her answer.

“Well... I live in Southern California. My name...” She floundered at their expressions, but squared her shoulders. “It’s Bailey Smith.” She hurried on, as if to be sure they didn’t have a chance to comment. “I’ve held all kinds of jobs since I graduated from high school, but I’m currently waitressing because I can do it nights and weekends. I’m about to start my senior year of college. A little late, but I finally got there.” Her lips had a wry twist. “Majoring in psychology. I don’t know what I want to do with it, but getting a degree feels...important.” She lifted her chin a little higher. “I wanted to make something of myself.”

“That’s wonderful.” Karen beamed some more. “What school are you in?”

Seth’s hand had been on his thigh, but he moved it to the sofa cushion where his knuckles just touched Bailey’s thigh. He waited for her to inch away, but she didn’t.

“USC,” she said. “Um, the University of Southern California.” She smiled weakly. “Go Trojans. Although I’m not really into sports.”

“Your father watches football and baseball—”

They all heard the front door open.

“Mom? Dad, why are you home?” Eve entered the living room, worry on her face. “There’s a police car here.” She stopped dead, her gaze moving from her father to her mother to Seth—and stopping on Bailey. Something dark entered her eyes. “I see.” She sounded almost casual. “The real daughter returns.”

CHAPTER THREE

BAILEY HUGGED HERSELF as Seth drove. “They still have my bed.” Why that blew her away, of all things, she had no idea, but it did.

She felt his swift glance. “I don’t think they changed a thing in your bedroom.”

“The whole room is pink.”

“You were only six. Little girls like pink and purple.”

She stole a look at him. “How do you know? Do you have children?”

Unless it was her imagination, his mouth curved. Because he liked knowing she was curious about him? “No children. Never been married. I have two nieces and friends who have kids.”

“Oh.” She swallowed. “I always pictured this perfect bedroom.” Her voice sounded faraway, bemused. “It was pink, and I had a canopy bed. Like a princess.”

“You did.”

“So... I was actually remembering.” She was stunned to know those dreams had really been memories. Standing in the door of that bedroom had left her shaken in a way the faces of her parents hadn’t. And how weird was that?

As if he understood, Seth said, “Memories are odd. Unpredictable. A couple of my very earliest memories are of semitraumatic moments, which makes sense. Others are totally random. Why do I remember standing at the foot of a staircase in what my mother tells me was probably my great-grandmother’s house, feeling really small? It’s just a snapshot, but vivid. Couldn’t have been an earth-shattering moment. For you, maybe you really loved having a bed with a canopy.”

She gave a funny, broken laugh that didn’t sound like her at all. “I did. I mean, I don’t know that, but I used to think about what my bedroom would look like if I ever had a home. You know. I’d change the wall color as I got older, but the bed was always there.” She sighed. “I hurt their feelings, didn’t I?”

“When you wouldn’t stay?”

And sleep in that canopy bed, the idea of which had freaked her out. As in, if she’d tried, she just knew she’d have run screaming into the night. More irrationality—it wasn’t as if she’d been snatched from her bedroom and therefore had trauma associated with it.

“Or even agree to stay for dinner. And when I didn’t fall into their arms.”

“Maybe,” he said, driving with relaxed competence. “But they’re so happy that you’re alive, they’ll get over it. My impression is they’re good people. They probably had fantasies. They’ll adjust to the reality, which is that you’re essentially strangers. Any sense of family or intimacy will have to be built from the ground up.”

Bailey bowed her head and stared at her hands. “I don’t know if I want to join the construction crew.”

He was quiet for a minute, a small frown furrowing his forehead. But he looked thoughtful, not irritated.

“Why did you come here?” he asked. “What changed your mind?”

Would he understand if she admitted she didn’t know? That she’d have sworn her original decision had been final, except that knowing she could find out who she’d been had nibbled at her until she’d finally decided to make this trip?

“Curiosity,” she said at last. All she was willing to admit to.

He made a sound in his throat she couldn’t interpret.

“You in school right now?” he asked.

She shook her head. “I didn’t sign up for summer semester. It gave me a chance to work a lot more hours and save for the tuition. Fall semester starts the last week of August.” Which was a month away. She added hastily, “I should get back to my job, though.”

“How long did you tell them you’d be gone?”

“I...left it sort of open-ended.”

He turned into the parking lot of the sheriff’s department. She scanned the lot for her rental car and was reassured to see it.

“Have you found a place to stay yet?” he asked.

God. She almost had to stay for a few days, didn’t she? She’d raised expectations, and she didn’t want to hurt those people who had looked at her with such hunger and happiness and puzzlement. And then there was the whole press conference thing, which really scared her.

Aghast, she suddenly wondered whether Canosa would even want her back. The food and atmosphere were supposed to be the focus, not one of the waitresses. What if people stared? Went there just to see her?

Maybe she could change her appearance. But would brown hair or glasses fool anyone who had once seen a good photo of her? Say, on the cover of People magazine?

Her stomach dipped. With an effort, she dragged her attention back to his last question.

“No. I assumed there’d be a hotel in town, or I could drive back to Mount Vernon.” It was a county away, but straddled the I-5 freeway, making it busier than off-the-beaten-track Stimson, which wasn’t on the way to anything but the Cascade Mountains.

“There’s a Quality Inn.”

She nodded; she’d seen it as she’d turned into town.

“Also a more rustic place just out of town called the River Inn. And a couple of bed-and-breakfasts.”

No B and Bs. She didn’t want to have nosy hosts or have to share a breakfast table with other guests. “If they have a vacancy, the Quality Inn will be fine.” The more anonymous the room, the better.

“Until the press arrives,” Seth said. “Then we’ll have to think of something else.”

She shuddered.

He gave her a quick look as he finished parking, then gripped her hand again.

“Will you have dinner with me, Bailey?”

“You can’t possibly want—” she began in panic.

He interrupted. “I want.” There was the smallest of pauses during which she tried to interpret his enigmatic tone. “It’ll give us time to talk this out. You can ask some of the questions that must be on your mind. We can plan our strategy.”

“You can ask questions,” she said with quick hostility.

He did the eyebrow lifting thing really well. “I won’t tonight, not if you’d rather I don’t. We will need to talk eventually about what you remember about your abductor. I’m a cop, Bailey. If he’s still out there grabbing little girls, he needs to be stopped if there’s any way in hell I can locate him.”

What could she do but nod? She hated the idea he might have another little girl right now, who called him Daddy. She had spent most of her life blocking out those images, except they crept into her dreams.

“But this evening—” Seth’s voice had softened “—we’ll set that aside. I think it would be better for you to talk out what you’re feeling than go hide in a hotel room.”

“I’m used to being alone.” It burst out of her before she could think twice. “I like being alone,” she said softly. Not answering to anyone.

He turned off the engine and sat waiting, just as he had in front of the Lawson home. A patient man, he knew when not to push. And that made him a dangerous man, too, she thought, at least to her.

“Fine,” she said, disgruntled but grateful all at the same time. She hadn’t been ready to stay at the Lawsons’ for dinner, but the idea of getting takeout and eating in a hotel room by herself held no appeal, either. At least, Detective Seth Chandler offered distraction.

“Okay,” he said, as if the outcome had never been in doubt. “I need to go in and check messages, make a few calls. Why don’t you check in at the Quality Inn, and I’ll pick you up there?”

“Fine,” she muttered again.

He smiled and took out his phone. “Give me your number so I can call when I’m on my way.”

She told him. Apparently not trusting her, he touched Send and waited until the phone in her bag rang. Then, satisfied, he put his away. His hand emerged from his pocket with a business card, which he handed her. “My number.”

He insisted on walking her to her car. Bailey had no doubt he memorized the license plate number, just in case she ran for it. Then he let her go, but kept watching until she turned onto the main street and she could no longer see him.

At which point she pulled to the curb, put the car into Park and bent forward, resting her forehead against the steering wheel. And then she did her best to breathe as she struggled with the kind of roiling emotions she hadn’t let herself feel in something like ten years.

Strangely, it was a picture of the man she’d just left that she fastened on. His physical strength, his relaxed, purely male walk, the big hand he’d touched her with whenever he sensed she needed support.

How did he know?

Breathe.

He just did, she admitted. Somehow, those dark eyes saw deeper than she liked. Except today, she was grateful.

A new swirl of panic joined all her other fears. She couldn’t let herself depend on him. She shouldn’t have agreed to dinner. When he called, she’d make an excuse.

Bailey moaned, knowing she’d just lied to herself. Yes, she had to be careful where he was concerned, but right now, she needed him. She, who never let herself need anyone, wasn’t sure she’d get through these next few days without the man she’d met less than three hours ago.

* * *

EVE’S MOTHER—ADOPTIVE MOTHER—laid down her fork. “I keep thinking I dreamed it. But Hope really was here, wasn’t she?”

This was probably the tenth time she’d said something similar since they sat down for dinner. All she’d done was stir her food around.

Dad laid his big, scarred hand over hers in a gesture more tender than Eve remembered seeing. “She was. We’ll see her again in the morning.”

Eve didn’t have much appetite, either. She’d done a lot of scrambling to make up for opening her big mouth at the sight of her sort-of sister.

“I only meant biological,” she had explained.

Apparently that was good enough, because they immediately dropped the subject and went back to exclaiming in shock and awe.

Hope, Hope, Hope.

And I’m being such a bitch, Eve thought miserably. She should be grateful to Hope, whose disappearance had given her a chance to have a family. Nobody else had wanted the rail-thin, withdrawn eight-year-old she had been when the Lawsons had taken her in.

She’d always known the truth. They hadn’t taken her because they’d fallen in love with her, but rather as penance. They felt guilty because they had failed their perfect daughter. For their own spiritual salvation, they needed to save another child.

Which still didn’t mean she hadn’t been lucky to be that child.

She remembered her first visit to this house, when Kirk had opened a door partway down the hall and said, “This will be your bedroom.”

Now she knew it had been a guest bedroom before she had arrived. Then, given the way she’d lived before she got taken into the foster system, she’d been thrilled because she’d have a queen-size bed all to herself and her own dresser and closet and everything.

Karen had stepped into the room behind Eve and looked around. “We’ll paint and decorate once you’ve decided how you’d like it to look,” she said. “What is your favorite color?”

“Pink,” she had whispered, and then seen the expression on the face of a woman who was thinking about becoming her mother. “And yellow,” she said hurriedly. Yellow, she saw, was safe.

She had lived with them for a week before she worked up the courage to open the door to the other bedroom that nobody went in or out of. I want this bedroom, she’d thought, indignation swelling in her, but she never said a word, because she knew. It was her bedroom. The lost daughter the social worker had told her about. The Lawsons had insisted that of course they would keep Eve even if Hope was restored to them, but then, she wasn’t sure she believed that. She’d stared at the pink bedroom with furniture painted white and edged with gilt, and at shelves filled with dolls dressed in beautiful clothes, and most of all at the bed with tall posts and gilt-painted finials and a white lace canopy, and she had envied until she ached.

She had mostly been ashamed of that envy, because the pretty blonde girl in all the pictures was probably dead even though her parents kept her bedroom for her and told everyone that they knew she was alive and would come home someday. But the envy had crept into her heart and stayed no matter what she did to root it out, and today it had made her say, “The real daughter returns.”

Of course Mom and Dad were ecstatic. They’d been given a miracle. Eve loved them. She had dreamed of seeing them truly happy, and now they were.

Just not because of any accomplishment of hers, any gift she gave them. She’d always believed, in the back of her mind, that she was engaged in a competition. She’d just never let herself see that it was one she couldn’t win. Her bringing home a gold medal in athletics, being accepted to Harvard Law School or crowned Miss America, none of those achievements would ever have erased the grief that cast its shadow over both of them. Only the return of their precious Hope could do that.

And I am happy, Eve told herself. Just...envious, too.

She smiled at her mother. “Hope’s coming to breakfast?”

Karen Lawson’s face was both softer and younger than Eve had ever seen it. “Yes. But remember she asked us to call her Bailey. Oh!” She hugged herself. “I can’t believe it.”

Eve offered to come over and make breakfast, but no, Mom wanted to make it with her own hands, because she’d been cheated of the chance of feeding her daughter so many other breakfasts.

“Waffles,” she decided. “Or crepes. I have all those lovely raspberries. Oh, my. I should have asked her what she likes.” Her expression cleared. “But of course she loved raspberries. Do you remember, Kirk? That time we took her with us to pick berries, and lost sight of her for a minute?” That clouded her face momentarily, but the smile broke through again. “And when we found her she was stuffing herself with berries, and her hands and face were stained with the juice?”

He chuckled. “She tried to claim she hadn’t been eating them and was astonished we didn’t believe her.”

How touching, Eve thought. My little sister lied.

And I am a lousy human being.

* * *

DAMN, SHE WAS BEAUTIFUL. Seth didn’t understand this intense reaction to Bailey Smith and wasn’t sure he liked it. He didn’t want to think it was related to the triumph of finding her. As in, I’m the creator.

That was just creepy.

The corner of his mouth twitched. Frankenstein’s monster, she wasn’t.

He had been tempted to take her home and cook dinner for them, but had had a suspicion she wouldn’t like that. Plus, this might be their last chance to go out in public without being noticed.

So he’d taken her to a local diner with high-backed booths and asked for the one in the far corner. Once the waitress led them to it, he didn’t give Bailey the choice. Instead, he slid in with his back to the wall facing the room and the door. It would have been his preference anyway, but what he liked tonight was that no one not standing right in front of their table would see her face.

After they ordered, she looked at him with big, clear eyes that were more gray than blue in this lighting.

“Eve wasn’t thrilled by my appearance.”

He’d been waiting for this one, and found himself in a spot. He’d silenced a call from Eve on the drive here from the hotel. He’d have to talk to her, if only to tell her he wouldn’t be calling again. An uncomfortable conversation he’d been avoiding. The last time they’d had dinner was almost three weeks ago. He’d been taking the coward’s way out, hoping she’d clue in to his waning interest.

He’d made no promises and had nothing to feel guilty about, except that it was damn awkward to have these feelings for Eve’s sister.

“I noticed that,” he admitted. “In a way, I’m not surprised. What did surprise me was that she didn’t hide how she felt.”

“Her parents were really taken aback.”

“I was glad Eve wasn’t there when Karen said that about the two best days of her life.”

“Because they were both associated with the real daughter,” Bailey murmured. “The one who doesn’t remember them and isn’t sure she wants to be bothered to get to know them.”

The one, he suspected, who didn’t want to admit she hungered for family.

“You knew Eve, too?” she asked.

He hesitated. “She and I dated for a while. I actually became interested in your disappearance after hearing the story from her.”

“Really.” It was as if he’d confirmed something she had already guessed. “‘Dated.’ Past tense?”

“Uh... I haven’t called her in a few weeks. It was never more than casual.”

She scrutinized him for an unnerving moment. “I shouldn’t have asked. It’s none of my business.”

Sure it is. His reaction was immediate and powerful. Seth didn’t share it.

“I don’t blame her if she resents me,” Bailey continued, sounding thoughtful. “When you first mentioned her, I couldn’t help thinking, So they replaced me. I’d have resented her, if I cared. You know.”

He knew. She had felt a pang of resentment she refused to acknowledge.

“When Eve first told me the story,” he said, “she sounded offhanded about it. ‘Here’s something out of the ordinary.’ I don’t think it crossed her mind I’d go anywhere with it, even though she told me because she knew I regularly work cold cases. Once I dug into it...” He hesitated, then shrugged. “She didn’t want to talk about it anymore. If I asked a question, she’d claim she didn’t know anything. Some bitterness may have been building...” He frowned. “I was going to say because her parents were suddenly obsessed with their loss again, but that isn’t really what happened. The truth is, I doubt an hour has passed in the last twenty-three years that Karen and Kirk didn’t think about you. They’d quit talking about it, that’s all. Until I gave them hope.” He grimaced at his choice of words. “Sorry.”

“I think I could hate that name.” Her voice was sharp. “It’s sappy. And, God, so wrong, considering what happened. And so wrong for me.” She pointed her thumb at herself. “The me I am.”

“Who are you, Bailey Smith?” he asked softly.

Her gaze clashed with his. “I’m not a nice person, in case you haven’t already figured that out. I don’t make close friends. I don’t have boyfriends.” Her warning was clear. “Don’t trust people.” Her tone curdled. “I am what he made me.”

Speaking of bitterness.

“That’s not true,” he said calmly, reaching for a roll, tearing it open and buttering it.

Her chin jutted. “You don’t know.”

“You enrolled in college. Did he have a single thing to do with making you the woman who’d do that?”

“My major. There’s nothing subtle about that.”

“No, I guess there isn’t. You’re trying to figure yourself out. Maybe him. But he wouldn’t have liked you doing either, would he?”

She finally looked away. “No. But my interest is because of him.” She didn’t have to say how much she hated knowing that. “If it never happened, if I’d grown up here as sunny Hope Lawson, who knows? I’d have probably gone off to college at eighteen and majored in literature or biology or dance. But psychology?” She shook her head.

“You’re right,” he agreed. “You’re a more complex person than you would have been. I won’t argue with that. Given what happened to you, I think it’s remarkable what you’ve become.”

“And what’s that?” she asked, the edge present.

“A smart, self-aware, poised woman who may claim she isn’t nice, but who was kind today to two people when she didn’t have to be.”

“Of course I had to be,” she grumbled.

He looked past her. “Dinner is coming,” he said quietly.

The diner did decent American basics—burgers, steaks, fries, onion rings, roasted chicken. He’d been glad she didn’t order one of their salads, which he felt sure came mostly out of a bag. He could be wrong, but he didn’t see her as a waitress at Denny’s or anyplace like that. With her looks and air of class, she could make a lot bigger bucks at someplace upscale.

Once their meals were in front of them, he asked about her job, thinking it might be a good idea to dial back the tension.

Of course he’d never heard of the restaurant, but it sounded expensive. “Do you get free meals?”

A surprised smile curved her mouth. His heart skipped a couple of beats.

“Of course I do. One per shift. Saves me a lot on the groceries, plus their food is really good. And I love Italian.”

“Me, too.” He glanced down at his steak. “Unfortunately, Stimson does not boast a fabulous Italian restaurant.”

She chuckled. “Nothing wrong with a hamburger.” She took a big bite of hers.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d dined out with a woman who ate with gusto. And red meat and French fries, no less. Apparently she didn’t worry too much about her weight. Not that he saw any reason she should.

She got him talking about the town and what it had to offer, seeming intrigued once Seth admitted he hadn’t grown up here.

“City life isn’t for me. I like to hike and I enjoy white-water rafting. I run to stay in shape and would rather not have to pound the pavement or go to the gym.”

“Do you ski?”

“Alpine on occasion—lift tickets aren’t cheap. Otherwise Nordic. We don’t get a lot of snow at this elevation, but we don’t have to drive very far to find it.”

She exercised at a gym. “Actually, the university, now. Saves me having to pay a membership. I do the elliptical, treadmill, swim laps. And most semesters I take a phys ed class. I like to try different things. Spring semester, it was African dance. Which turned out to be really good for the thighs,” she said ruefully.

He laughed.

Their conversation was starting to feel as if they were on a date. When she suddenly scowled at him, he wondered if she’d had the same thought and was fighting it.

“What makes you think you know me?” she challenged. “Smart, self-aware, poised. Kind?” She said it as if the very idea was ludicrous.

He swirled a fry in ketchup. “You denying any of that?”

“Yes.”

“Which part?”

“I’m not kind. I’m...oh, I suppose I’m mostly a decent person. I mean, I don’t go out of my way to slap people down. But I don’t go out of my way to extend a helping hand, either.” She glared as if to say, How dare you put that label on me?

Seth didn’t let himself smile. “We’ll see,” was all he said.

Her eyes narrowed, but she abruptly shifted gears. “You said my... Karen was a teacher. Elementary or high school or what?”

“Kindergarten.”

Looking stricken, she breathed, “Oh.”

“You were about to start first grade.”

“How...awful.”

“That’s safe to say.”

He stayed quiet, letting her process what he guessed was a real hit: her first true understanding of what losing her had done to them, the couple she didn’t want to say were her parents.

“And Eve? Do you know what she does?” She tilted her head. “Of course you do, since you had a relationship.”

“Calling what we had a relationship is a stretch.” He tried to sound mild. Easier because he and Eve had never made it to bed. Thank God they hadn’t. He’d known she was willing and, at first, he’d fully intended to take her up on it. And why not?

He had a sharp, unsettling realization. I saw Hope’s face, the woman she would be if she had lived to grow up. That’s why not. God. Eve had had good reason to resent his sudden, obsessive interest in the sister who must have haunted that house. Today, he’d had trouble making himself meet her eyes. He hoped she hadn’t noticed the way he was looking at Bailey.

He grimaced. Yeah, what were the odds of that? Of course she’d noticed.

“What’s that face you’re making?” Bailey looked wary. “You don’t want to tell me what she does for a living. Why?”

“No, I don’t mind telling you. I had a passing thought, that’s all.” An epiphany. “She’s a social worker with DSHS. Washington State Department of Social and Health Services. She oversees kids who are dependents of the court.”

“Foster children,” Bailey said slowly.

“Some of them. Some she supervises in their own homes, making sure the families are showing up for counseling, keeping their kids clean, not abusing them.”

She gave a funny laugh. “I suppose she majored in psychology.”

“I don’t know. She has a master’s degree in social work from UW.”

“And me, I still have another year just to get my BA.”

“Bailey.” He waited until she was looking at him. “She’s a year younger than you, but she had advantages you didn’t. She had parents who put her through college. She didn’t have to earn her own way. She had support.”

After a moment, she nodded.

“You do have something in common. She lived in foster homes for several years before your parents took her in. All I know is that her mother died, but I don’t get the feeling her life was any picnic before that, either.”

“So on that watershed day, the seesaw flipped.” And she sounded flippant when he knew she felt anything but.

“You know it isn’t that simple.”

“Kinda seems that way.”

“It was three more years before your parents took in Eve.”

She scowled. “I wish you’d quit calling them that.”

“Your parents? Why? They are.”

“Were.”

“Ah.”

The scowl morphed into a glower. “What’s that mean?”

He gave into impulse and took her hand again. “It means I get it.”

“Does it mean you’ll quit calling them that?” She tugged to get her hand free, but half-heartedly.

“I’ll try,” he said. “No guarantee.”

“Great,” she muttered.

He smiled, squeezed her hand and let it go. “Hey, you want dessert?”

“Are their pies as good as they look?”

“Why do you think I come here?”

He hadn’t seen many of her smiles yet, but he especially liked this one.

“Of course I want dessert.” She pushed away her plate, only a few fries uneaten. “I don’t suppose you’d like to have breakfast with us tomorrow.”

Despite the tone that said, Of course I’m not serious, he felt a glow of warmth beneath his breastbone. She might deny it, but she wanted him at her side in the morning.

“I wasn’t invited,” he pointed out.

“I noticed.” She sighed. “And I know I have to do this. It’s just...” After a moment she shrugged. “Will you think I’m even more of a coward if I confess I hope your Eve isn’t there?”

“Not my Eve,” he said curtly, then frowned at his own vehemence. Damn, he had to call Eve. “And no, I don’t blame you. I doubt she will be. She’ll understand they want time with you. To get to know you, and...” He hesitated.

“Stare at me?”

His mouth quirked. “Probably. I was going to say, to rejoice.”

“Fine,” she finally said. But then she looked at him, dead serious. “Will you be masterminding the press conference?”

“Yes.”

“Can we, um, talk about it?”

“Yeah.” He waited until they’d both ordered pie and the waitress was walking away before he took her hand again. “Here’s the plan.”

She held on tight.

CHAPTER FOUR

“I OWE YOU an apology for yesterday. I mean, for bolting the way I did,” Bailey said first thing the next morning, after arriving at the Lawsons’ house.

Kirk looked at her kindly. “We understood.”

He had a good face, craggy and lined, and his eyes... I have his eyes, she thought in shock.

“Of course we did,” Karen hastened to add, but less believably. More than Kirk, she made Bailey uneasy. Maybe mother and daughter had been closer than father and daughter. It did make sense. But also, before coming to Washington for this reunion, Bailey had searched online for the original newspaper articles about her disappearance. She knew that she’d been at a swimming lesson at the high school pool, open all summer for community use. That particular day, Karen had decided to run some errands during the time rather than watch. She’d been held up at train tracks while a very long freight train passed, making her a few minutes late. When she arrived at the high school, most of the kids who had taken lessons at the same time were gone with their parents. Others had arrived for the next set of lessons, but nobody had seen Hope. Not struggling with a man, not waiting, not so much as leaving the dressing room although she had apparently changed, because the locker she’d used was empty and her swim bag had disappeared, too. And Karen Lawson had to have struggled for twenty-three years with the knowledge that, if only she’d stayed to watch the lesson, her child wouldn’t have been abducted. If only she’d started back to the high school two minutes sooner, she’d have crossed the tracks before the train came by, and would have been there to meet her daughter in the dressing room.

If only.

Bailey hadn’t had any reason to feel guilt; she didn’t get close enough to people to let them down. But she understood the concept, and if only had to be the most damning of phrases.

“Please, come in and sit down,” Karen said. “Breakfast is ready.”

“Is Eve here this morning?”

“She let me know last night that she couldn’t make it,” Karen said over her shoulder. “Work, I’m sure.”

Relieved though she was, Bailey had to wonder if Eve had really felt welcome. Or did she feel as if she was extraneous to this small nuclear family, now that Hope was home again?

No, they’d probably talked after Bailey fled yesterday. The Lawsons seemed like nice people. They wouldn’t sideline their adopted daughter.

And really, what is it with me? Bailey thought with incredulity. So, okay, she was majoring in psychology. That didn’t mean she usually bothered analyzing everyone else’s secret motives or wounds.

The dining room was as perfect as the rest of the house. Old-fashioned, as if it hadn’t been updated in a while. Say, twenty-three years. But nice, with an antique china hutch, table and chairs, a big tatted doily in the center of the table with a vase of orange, daisylike flowers, and a Persian-looking rug on the hardwood floor.

They sat down to a spread that widened Bailey’s eyes. Gorgeous crepes with perfect, red raspberries ready to spoon over them along with luscious Devonshire cream, crisp strips of bacon and a selection of other fruits, all beautifully presented. Karen must have worked for ages.

“Oh, this looks lovely,” Bailey made herself say with a smile. The same one she gave diners at Canosa. “As nice as anything I’ve ever served.”

Karen beamed and handed Bailey the crepes. “I remembered how much you loved raspberries.”

Did I? Bailey couldn’t actually remember the last time she’d eaten one. They were awfully expensive at the grocery store. But she kept the smile pinned in place and said, “I still do.”

And then came the questions. Did she remember how much fun they’d had picking raspberries? No. The county fair—she’d always looked forward to it so. She wasn’t the slightest bit afraid of heights! Did she remember...? No. She’d begged for horseback riding lessons, and they’d finally found a place to take her that summer. Did she remember...? No.

Bailey’s throat grew tight. She smooshed a raspberry with her fork rather than take a bite she wasn’t sure she could swallow.

Karen opened her mouth again, and Kirk laid a hand on her arm. Out of the corner of her eye, Bailey saw his slight shake of the head.

“Detective Chandler says you machine-quilt,” she said brightly. “I’d love to see what you’re working on.”

Karen forced a smile. “I’ll show you after breakfast. We were lucky to have four bedrooms. Neither of us had any use for a home office, like people all seem to have these days. This way I can close the door on all my mess.”

“I don’t even have one bedroom,” Bailey heard herself saying. “Mine is a studio apartment. Rents are high in LA. I’ve been tempted to buy a Murphy bed, so I could put it up when I’m entertaining, except—” she was winding down “—well, I don’t entertain very often.”

“You have a bedroom here.”

Her stomach twisted. A bedroom that had been kept as a shrine for twenty-three years. The idea creeped her out.

“Do you remember anything at all?” Karen begged.

She set down her fork. “The bedroom. I know it’s weird, but I remember the bedroom.”

The face of this stranger who was her mother lit with happiness. “I’m so glad we didn’t change it, then.”

“I’m not six anymore,” she said, sharper than she’d meant.

The happy expression froze, then slipped away. It was like watching death happen, and Bailey felt like a crummy human being. See? she wanted to say to Seth. I’m not kind.

Smart she’d give him. She’d found her college classes easier than she’d expected. Poised...maybe.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have said that. This is...” She moved uncomfortably. “I guess it’s harder than I thought it would be.”

“No,” Karen said with dignity that surprised Bailey for some reason. “I was pushing you. It’s difficult to accept that the daughter we missed every day of her life doesn’t remember us at all.”

“I’m hoping it will come back.” Am I really? She honestly didn’t know. “He didn’t want me to remember. So I have this kind of mental block. But...maybe the memories are still there, on the other side of it?”

Some of the happiness bloomed again on Karen’s face. The one that looked so much like Bailey’s, unsettling her. She’d never had what other people took for granted, the ability to think, It’s Mom’s fault I have skin so ridiculously white I burn whenever I step outside, or, It’s not my fault I can’t carry a tune in a bucket, it’s Dad’s. Other people could make a face and say, My family is cursed with freckled redheads, but her, not a clue who to credit or blame for the thousands of bits and pieces that made her up.

Except for him. She’d spent a lot of time wondering about the nature versus nurture thing. How much was his fault? Maybe she’d been abused at home, too, which made her easily trained by him. At that point she always felt sick. Had she been dumb enough to let herself be lured by him, or had he taken her forcibly? Why hadn’t she run away from him? She still didn’t know.

Now, at least she could say, I have my dad’s eyes and Mom’s cheekbones. And my mother’s smile. Seeing it made her skin burn and feel too tight.

She could hardly wait to get out of here. But this was why she’d come. To meet these people, to get to know them, open the possibility of some kind of relationship, if they still wanted one when they found out how truly messed up she was. Mostly she didn’t mind being alone, but there were times, like the holidays, when she listened to other people complaining about family and buying gifts that probably got returned or tossed in a drawer, and she’d think, At least you have somewhere to go. The Neales invited her every year, but they’d had a lot of foster kids since her. Going to their house, she’d have felt like a ghost from Christmases past, chains rattling.

Say something.

“Was I horse crazy?” was what popped out.

It was that easy. A question now and again, and she heard all about her childhood. Listening was surreal. Her life sounded like something out of a storybook, as if nothing had ever gone wrong, nobody had ever argued and Hope had mostly gotten her heart’s desires, including a “princess” bed.

No wonder I was in shock, she thought. Maybe...maybe she had quit believing in that perfect childhood. It must have seemed as unreal as Disneyland. A phantasm. Maybe, to survive, she’d had to quit believing.

She noticed that Kirk didn’t say much. About all he did was murmur agreement when his wife said, Do you remember when...? Those steady blue eyes stayed on Bailey. Seth had told her Kirk was quiet, but she began to suspect he was more sensitive to her mood and discomfort than Karen was.

Finally, he laid his hand over Karen’s to prevent another spate of reminiscences. Although she looked startled, she also closed her mouth. He cleared his throat. “There’s so much we don’t know, Bailey. Can you tell us what happened?”

As if the air had been sucked out of the room, she suddenly couldn’t breathe. It took everything she had not to leap up and say, “I’ve got to go.” But years of therapy paid for by the state of California had brought her to a point where she knew to breathe deeply and clear her mind before she did or said anything. Be calm. You don’t have to do this.

She shook her head. “I don’t like to talk about it.”

“Oh, but—”

Once again, Kirk’s big hand gently stopped his wife’s outburst. Bailey found herself staring at that hand. It filled her vision to the point where she didn’t see their faces. Why a hand? That hand? Don’t know.

“Detective Chandler said you spent years in foster care,” he said.

Not the best part of her life, either, but this she could talk about. She wrenched her gaze from Kirk’s hand.

“Six years. I didn’t know how old I was, so we guessed. I aged out of the foster care system when we thought I was eighteen. As it turns out, I’d have been only seventeen.”

Pain showed on a face rough-hewn enough to almost be homely. “Did you have a good home?” he asked.

“I...actually was moved several times.” More like seven or eight times, but who was counting? “I was pretty traumatized at first. I hardly spoke at all. He... I was way behind in school.” Yep, eleven years old and she had kindergarten under her belt. “Of course they had no idea what was wrong initially. They put me in special ed classes, but I picked things up so fast, I was back in regular classrooms after about a year. I must have already been reading pretty well when—you know.”

Tears in her eyes, Karen nodded. “You were reading at a second-grade level after kindergarten.”

Bailey nodded. “I kept reading. Books, when I could get my hands on them, or newspapers or just about anything. And I watched TV, so I knew about politics and crime—”

Both flinched.

“Not a clue about multiplication tables,” she said lightly. She hadn’t had a clue about so many things. “I’d never had a chance to use a computer.” She shrugged. “But, like I said, I adapted fast. The first few years were hard, though.”

“But...you’d been rescued from so much worse,” Karen faltered.

How do you know? Bailey thought resentfully, but caught herself. The fact she’d just admitted to receiving no education in those missing years must have given them a hint. Of course he hadn’t dared put her in school, even aside from the fact that he couldn’t produce the identification or records any school district would have demanded. Never mind the fact he kept them on the move. She’d didn’t remember ever staying in the same place more than a couple of months.

She tried to think how to explain how fish-out-of-water she’d felt after he left her.

“Any reality gets so it’s almost comfortable. The new reality was so extremely different—I didn’t fit. I didn’t know how to relate to people.” Not as if she was an expert at that, even now. “I withdrew, and a lot of foster parents didn’t know how to deal with that, even if they were well-meaning.” Seeing their faces, she said hastily, “I had some nice ones along the way, though. I lived with the same family my last three years. They’re...good people. I’ve stayed in touch.”

“Oh.” Karen dabbed at her wet cheeks with her cloth napkin. “I’d love to be able to thank them.”

“I...maybe I can introduce you sometime.” Weird thought. Weirder was realizing that once the press conference happened, the Neales would read all about her history, just as everyone else she knew would. Maybe she should call them before that happened.

Your life will never be the same. Hearing Seth’s voice, she felt panic swell in her, stealing her breath again. Everyone would know. Casual friends, fellow students, employers. Her face would become famous.

It already is.

The Lawsons were both staring at her in alarm, and she wondered what she’d given away.

“Um, have you told anyone else about me?”

“Yes, of course. I called your grandma and grandpa Peters, and your grandma Lawson.” Karen looked momentarily sad. “Your grandfather Lawson died two years ago of a stroke. I wish he could have lived to see this day. And, well, I called my sister, and Kirk’s brother, and some friends. I’m sure Eve has told people. She was so excited.”

Sure she was.

But what boggled Bailey’s mind was the number of people who already knew.

“You don’t think any of them would have called a reporter, do you?” she asked anxiously.

“I can’t imagine,” Karen exclaimed, looking shocked. “Why would they?”

“Because my reappearance is news? Big news, and they might enjoy the attention?”

“But that’s...that’s...” She stopped, either unable to describe what that was or because understanding was finally dawning. “You’ve surely told people, too,” she said at last.

Bailey shook her head. “Nobody.”

“Not even friends?”

“No. I...wasn’t sure I believed it.”

“That you’re our Hope.”

“Yes.”

“Do you now?” Kirk asked, eyes keen on her face.

Bailey tried to smile. “It’s hard not to. I mean, look at us.”

He glanced at Karen’s face and back to Bailey. “Nobody could mistake you two for anything but mother and daughter.”

“There’s the birthmark, too.”

He nodded, as if feeling a weight settling onto him. “Your smile. We’ll have to show you pictures.”

“I’d like that,” she lied.

“You think we’ll need to have the press conference right away,” Karen said suddenly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t use my head. I don’t believe anybody close to us would go to the press, but everyone I called has probably told everyone they’ve talked to since. I should have kept it quiet until you were ready.”

Bailey couldn’t help making a face. “Are you ever ready for something like this?”

“No. Oh, my. A press conference. Everyone will be staring at us.” She sounded appalled. “What should we wear?”

Bailey laughed, the familiar, feminine wail providing comic relief. “I have absolutely no idea. I’ve seen this kind of press conference on TV without ever paying the slightest attention to what people were wearing. I’m not sure anybody cares.”

Her mother’s back straightened. “I care.”

“So do I,” Bailey admitted, then thought—wait. Did I just think of her as my mother?

Yes.

“I suppose we should talk to Seth—I mean, Detective Chandler. He said he’d arrange everything.”

“Should we call him?” Karen sounded dithery.

“I agreed to meet him later today,” Bailey said. “I’ll call you after I do, okay? Um, I should get your phone number.”

Adding so many new numbers to her contacts list made this all seem real.

Jarred, she thought, Another new reality.

She added the Lawsons’ home phone, Kirk’s cell phone, and Eve’s cell phone.

“She doesn’t have a home phone,” Karen said, sounding mildly disapproving.

“I don’t, either. Most people our age don’t.”

Her phone rang, startling her. Seth. She answered. “Is something wrong?”

“Not wrong.” He hesitated. “I just had an inquiry from a journalist at our local paper asking if there was any truth to the rumor that Hope Lawson had been found alive and well.”

Bailey closed her eyes. “We were just talking about that. Karen called everyone in the family as well as some friends. And of course they may have spread the word, too.”

“Cat’s out of the bag. I think we need to accelerate our timing. I’ve talked to the sheriff and our PR people. We want to do it this afternoon.”

He gave her details. There was apparently a small auditorium of sorts in the new public safety building that held the courthouse as well as the Stimson city police department. The sheriff’s department was borrowing it. Someone was already calling news outlets.

“I think we’ll have a full house, Bailey.”

“Oh, God.”

“It might be good if we can get Eve there, too. Otherwise, someone will think to corner her later for a quote. Best to get it over with in one gulp.”

She pictured herself slithering down some monster’s maw. Lovely thought.

“Um... Karen wants to know what we should wear.”

There was a prolonged moment of silence. “Something nice?” He sounded out of his element. “No big prints or gaudy colors. Probably not too dressy.”

“No sequins. Check.”

“Business casual.”

“Gotcha.” Sort of. Even as her heart raced, she mentally sorted through the clothes she’d brought with her.

“After you change, I think you’re going to want to check out of the Quality Inn. If you feel ready to stay with the Lawsons—”

“No,” she said too quickly.

Another silence. “All right.” He said it so gently. “We’ll talk about it when I see you. Lunch?”

She glanced guiltily at her plate. She really hadn’t done justice to this breakfast, and Karen must have worked so hard on it.

Pathetic though it was, she’d have begged if she’d had to. She swallowed. “Yes, please.”

“I’ll get takeout. We can park somewhere.”

“That...sounds good.” Her gaze slid sideways again to the amount of food left on her plate. Maybe by then she’d have conquered this roiling in her belly and be hungry.

Letting him go, she then had to detail the plans to the Lawsons, watching Karen’s eyes widen again.

“Eve? Oh, my.”

“I hope this isn’t a problem for her, given her job. She’ll suffer from some reflected notoriety.”

“Oh, my.”

Which pretty well said it all.

* * *

SETH STEPPED BACK into the small staging room where all four Lawsons huddled like a herd of deer unsure which way to leap. Kirk looked his usual stoic self, if uncomfortable in a white shirt and tie, Karen excited and terrified all at once, Bailey resigned and Eve... He couldn’t quite tell.

He’d call her tonight. Or even take her aside after the circus was over, if he had a chance.

“We’re set up,” he told them. “There are a lot of cameras out there. Ignore them. Look people in the eyes when you talk. Along with reporters, we have some curiosity seekers.” His mouth quirked. “I saw the Stimson police chief himself standing at the back.”

Over lunch, eaten at a relatively deserted riverside park, Bailey had finally thought to ask why a detective with the county sheriff’s department was investigating, given that the Lawsons lived in Stimson. The high school, she’d learned, was outside city limits. Since that’s where the crime had occurred, the original and any continuing investigation had been the responsibility of the sheriff’s department.

The sheriff himself had shaken all their hands and been briefed to do the initial talking. Usually detectives stayed in the background, but under the circumstances he’d warned Seth to expect to have to answer questions.

“All right,” he said quietly. “Let’s do this.”

He ushered them all onto the stage. Flashes momentarily blinded him. He blinked as they continued. The forest of big-ass cameras was intimidating as hell. He’d ended up by design with a hand on Bailey’s back. He felt her stiffen, but a sidelong glance reassured him that she and Eve looked remarkably poised. The parents...well, everyone would expect out-of-control emotions.

An experienced, folksy speaker, Sheriff Jaccard had his audience bespelled from the moment he began.

“Twenty-three years ago, a little girl who’d been born and grown up in Stimson vanished into thin air. The community was shaken when news of the abduction spread. Even then, we had our share of crime, but having a child snatched by a stranger under the noses of a whole lot of other parents scared the daylights out of everyone. How was it that not a soul, adult or child, had seen anything at all? This department’s best efforts never produced a fruitful lead. The FBI had no more success. Six-year-old Hope Lawson was gone, for all intents and purposes, from the face of the earth. Her parents were left to grieve and yet cling to their belief that she would someday come home. The rest of us...well, we came to assume she was dead.” He swept the audience with a gaze that commanded attention. “We were wrong.”

Exclamations and shouted questions filled the auditorium.

When they died down briefly, he raised his voice. “We’ll take questions eventually, but first let me finish. Hope Lawson is with us today because of Detective Seth Chandler, who has a special interest in pursuing cold cases. He moved to Stimson only three years ago and had never heard of Hope until someone mentioned her disappearance to him. He’s had some success in tracing missing people, in part because law enforcement agencies are getting a lot better at communicating with each other. But Hope didn’t appear in any of those databases, either. He took the extra step of having an artist create an age-progressed picture.” The sheriff used his laptop, open on the podium, to project a picture on the white screen behind him. He turned to look at it, as everyone in the audience did the same. “This is that picture.”

The flashes dazzled Seth’s eyes again. Photographers, crouching, got as close to the stage as they could, probably trying to get Bailey and the picture in the same frame.

The sheriff explained how Seth had created interest in the case and how the picture had spread across social media sites until someone had said to a young woman, “Your picture is online.” He smiled and stepped aside, motioning Bailey to join him. “Meet Hope Lawson.”

Again questions flew before she could open her mouth. Again he waited for quiet and said, “She’s prepared a statement.”

Poised had been a good word to use for her, Seth thought. Given her background, it was hard to understand where she’d come by so much strength and confidence. Confidence that hid a whole lot of damage and a mess of insecurities, he suspected, but the beautiful woman who gazed calmly at the roomful of people and cameras had one fine facade.

“I do not remember the abduction itself,” she began. “I spent the next five years with a man I do remember. I presume he was the one to take me, although he might have acquired me from someone else. Eventually, he abandoned me in a motel room in Bakersfield, California.” Head high, she looked around. “By then, I no longer remembered my name or family. He had taught me to call him Daddy. Authorities were unable to locate him, but assumed he was my father. I was placed in the foster care system, where I was fortunate enough to have some fine people to help me heal.” She talked about graduating from high school and working a variety of jobs before deciding to get a college degree. “A part of me was afraid to walk into the sheriff’s department and say, ‘I think I’m Hope Lawson.’ I wasn’t at all sure I really was, and also...acknowledging it forces me to face a great deal from my past. I know you have questions, and I will answer some, but not all. I ask you to respect my right to privacy.”

The questions flew. She did answer some. Seth answered others. Yes, he told them, Bailey had that day submitted a sample for a DNA test, but along with the obvious family resemblance and Bailey’s memory of her background, a birthmark had solidified their certainty that she was Hope. Karen did most of the talking for the Lawsons, but Eve told everyone there how thrilled she was to have Hope home.

“After I came to live with the Lawsons, I felt incredibly lucky. But I was always conscious of a hole in our family. Hope was missing. Somewhere, I had a sister out there. Now—” she aimed a shy but warm smile at Hope “—she’s home.”

Truth, Seth thought, but not all of it.

Tears ran down Karen’s face. Kirk swiped some from his own cheeks. Cameras caught it all.

At last the sheriff stepped up to the podium again and made a plea for everyone to respect the Lawsons’ need for privacy and space to move ahead with their lives. Trying for unobtrusive, Seth opened the door at the back of the stage and signaled for the family to fade back.

The moment he’d closed the door, Karen burst into sobs. Looking helpless, Kirk put his arms around her. Eve hovered close, murmuring comforting words, while Bailey stood apart looking helpless and awkward.

“I’m so happy!” Karen wailed, and Seth sort of understood. Twenty-three years’ worth of agony, despair, guilt and hope—yeah, hope—had all been released today to fly free.

Whether she liked it or not, Bailey Smith now had a family, with all the complications that entailed.

CHAPTER FIVE

“MOM TOLD ME you need a place to stay,” Eve said in a low voice her parents wouldn’t hear. “That Seth insists you move out of the hotel.”

They had been ushered into a conference room in the public safety building to wait for the tumult to die down so they could all slip away.

“He thinks some members of the press might be staying there,” Bailey agreed. “That they’re all going to try to get me by myself. I packed and checked out earlier.”

“You can stay with me if you want.” Eve sounded offhanded, even abrupt. “I don’t have a spare bedroom, but I do have a pullout couch.”

Bailey tilted her head, assessing the sincerity of this woman whom she’d barely met. Eve was trying to hide it, but, if Bailey read her right, she fairly bristled with dislike and resentment. It seemed ludicrous they had to pretend to have a sisterly relationship.

Was there any chance she actually did want them to get better acquainted? But all Bailey had to do was meet that expressionless gaze to know the answer. No. Her parents had thought it would be wonderful if Bailey stayed with her. She’d just about had to make the offer. But she wanted Bailey in her apartment about as much as Bailey wanted to be there.

Of course, there was the little problem of where she would go. One of those freeway exit hotels back in Mount Vernon, she thought, even as she studied Eve.

Her adopted sister was beautiful. Bailey knew when she was outshone. The other thing that stood out was how very different they looked, making her wonder if the Lawsons had asked for a foster daughter who bore no resemblance to their lost child. Had that occurred to Eve? Something else that might sting.

Masses of dark, curly hair fell to the middle of Eve’s back and framed a delicate, heart-shaped face. She had huge, brown eyes accentuated by long, dark lashes. She didn’t have to plaster on mascara to make her eyelashes visible, or use a pencil to color in pale eyebrows. Her complexion was dark enough to suggest she might be half Latina or Italian or—who knew?—Philippine or Arabic. Arabian nights, was what Bailey had thought, seeing her. Eve’s looks were somehow exotic, although she didn’t have the lush body that would make her a fortune at belly dancing. She was slimmer than Eve, almost slight, and small-breasted.

“Thank you for offering,” she said pleasantly, “but I already have something arranged.”

Eve’s nostrils flared. “I suppose Seth has taken care of you.”

Bailey refused to give anything away. “He’s been thoughtful.”

“Oh, he can be that.” Her lip curled the tiniest amount. “Until he’s not.” Eve turned her back, excluding Bailey. “Mom, Dad, if we go out the side door we ought to be able to make our getaway.”

Karen gazed beseechingly at Bailey. “Oh, but... Hope.”

“She has someplace else to stay.” Eve didn’t so much as glance over her shoulder.

Bailey took a deep breath, centered herself and smiled at Karen. My mother. “Could we have lunch tomorrow?”

“Oh!” Her cheeks pink, she turned her head as if it was a given she’d consult her husband. “Kirk, can you make it?”

He patted her back. “I think Bailey was inviting just you. It might be easier for her to get to know us one-on-one.”

“You don’t mind?”

He shook his head. “Of course I don’t. Bailey and I, well, we’ll have a chance.”

For some reason, the idea of spending time with him caused jolts of anxiety. Not fear—she didn’t think she’d ever been afraid of him, but...there was something.

Karen smiled. “Then I would love to have lunch with you, Hope.”

“I’ll call you in the morning, if that’s all right,” Bailey suggested.

“Perfect.”

Eve gave one narrow-eyed look over her shoulder, then escorted her parents out of the room. Bailey heard the deep grit of Seth’s voice speaking to them. From where she was standing, she couldn’t hear every word, but she made out enough to gather he was trying to separate Eve from her parents and failing because they were oblivious. The voices all faded as he apparently walked them out.

She sank into a chair at the long table, wishing she could take off, too. If she knew where to go—

Hostility masking all-too-familiar panic had her stiffening. Who said she had to consult him? She didn’t need Seth Chandler. Yes, he had been nice, but she knew damn well how he saw her. His ticket to fame and advancement. He’d be damn near as famous as she would be. The dedicated, caring detective who worked tirelessly to bring Hope Lawson home despite the heavy weight of his caseload. She could just hear it, said solemnly by a newscaster introducing the story.

Her suitcase was in the trunk of her rental. If she was lucky, she could dodge him and just go. To a hotel that wasn’t in Stimson. Maybe even one all the way south of Seattle by SeaTac. She could fly out in the morning. Call and apologize to Karen. Promise to stay in touch.

She jumped up from the chair, snatched up her bag and made for the door.

A couple of heads turned when she appeared in the hall, but she saw only one person. Seth, striding toward her, lines creasing his forehead. Frustration? Irritation? She couldn’t tell. But his expression changed when his gaze locked on her like a heat-seeking missile.

Her knees inexplicably wobbled. She squared her shoulders and raised her chin. “Detective.”

“Where do you think you’re going?” he demanded.

“Leaving?”

He gripped her arm. “I thought this would be a good time for us to talk.”

Her heart contracted. “Talk?”

“I want to put that son of a bitch behind bars where he can never touch a little girl again,” he said with controlled ferocity. “Never so much as set eyes on one.”

Without volition, she retreated a step. “I...didn’t realize you intended to do that so soon.” She was infuriated by the die-away tone. Gothic heroine, ready to swoon. Unfortunately, she felt close.

His hand on her arm tightened. “Are you all right, Bailey?”

“No.” She tried to keep backing away. “This has been a really hard day. I don’t... I can’t...”

“Will it be any easier tomorrow?”

This gentler tone weakened her. Damn him, she thought furiously. It was as if he knew exactly what buttons to push.

“I don’t know, but forgive me if I’m not eager to dredge up the nightmare I’ve spent a whole lot of years doing my damnedest to suppress.”

“You want to let him get away with what he did to you?” His stare was hard now, all cop. Tactic number two: lay some guilt on her.

Trembling, she said, “What I want is to erase him from my memory.”

“What if he’s stalking a little girl right now?”

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