Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 100853 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 504(@200wpm)___ 403(@250wpm)___ 336(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100853 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 504(@200wpm)___ 403(@250wpm)___ 336(@300wpm)
I knew from being around Griffen and Hope so much that Cooper meant Cooper Sinclair of Sinclair Security. Griffen had worked for him for years, and they considered each other as close as brothers. I hoped that extended to Cooper keeping Griffen’s actual brother safe.
“Yeah, I got it,” Ford said. “I’m staying for the call with Cooper.”
Griffen nodded in agreement and then turned his attention back to the manila envelope. He read the first letter, and then the next, handing them to Hope when he was finished. Halfway through, he said, “This isn’t right.”
I watched them, letting my nerves settle.
“What do you mean?” Hope asked, looking up from the letter in her hands.
“The handwriting.” He set the letter down and looked at Ford. “Do you still have any of those postcards she used to send?”
Ford’s fingers uncurled from my hand, and he stood. “I’ll be right back.” He strode from the room, leaving Griffen and Hope alone with me.
“It seems like they were so much in love,” Hope said. “But I still don’t understand how she could have left her children.” She looked to me. “How he could have left you.”
“I wasn’t even born yet,” I said quietly. The pain was dull, but there, as it always was.
“Still.” She laid her hand over her flat stomach, glancing over to the crib in the corner where Stella lay on her back, playing with a brightly colored toy. “I still don’t understand how they could have so much love for each other and leave their children.”
“Me neither,” I said in a whisper, my heart aching at the thought. “But they did.”
Ford came back in. He laid three postcards on the desk, pictures down, the writing facing up.
I leaned forward and read upside down:
Happy 10th birthday, Ford.
Love, Mom
“That’s it?” I said. “Is that all you got from her?” It was almost worse than if there’d been nothing. The disinterest was clear. God, people could be so awful.
He shrugged. “One a year until I was in, I don’t know, my early twenties. Then they stopped.”
I looked to the next one:
I can’t believe you’re 13, my little man. Hope you have a great one.
Love, Mom
So cheerful and detached. It didn’t sound like the woman who’d written the letters to my father.
“The handwriting doesn’t match,” Griffen said. “It’s similar, but it’s not the same.”
“What?” Ford said from beside me. He grabbed one of the letters and a postcard and held them side by side. Up close, I could see what Griffen meant. The curve of the S wasn’t the same, and the E’s were narrower on the postcards. The I’s in the letters were punctuated with a dot. And, in the postcards, a small circle.
“So, which are the fakes?” Hope asked. “The letters or the postcards?”
“The postcards,” Griffen said.
“How do you know?” Ford asked.
Griffen shook his head. “I don’t. But my gut says the letters are the real thing. Plus, the fact that they were with that picture, which probably only our mother had…” Griffen looked to me. “Do you mind if I hang on to these?”
I had the same sudden impulse I’d had when Ford had asked the same, to snatch them back and hide them away. “I know they were written by your mother, but I don’t have much that was my father’s,” I said. “Will I get them back?”
Griffen nodded. “I’d like to get one of them checked for fingerprints, which might leave some powder on the paper.”
“Okay,” I agreed. I’d wanted to investigate. This was my chance. “I want to know the truth as much as you do.”
“I’ll be careful with them,” Griffen promised.
Hope stepped back from the desk. “I’m going to take Stella up.”
A knock sounded on the door. We looked to see Hawk pushing it open.
“I’ll fill Hawk in,” Griffen said, gesturing to the letters and postcards on his desk.
Hope scooped Stella into her arms with a coo before turning my way. “Paige, would you come with me?”
My gut sank. She’d seemed supportive, but things could be different in private. I followed her out of the room, looking back to meet Ford’s eyes. He gave me a reassuring chin lift, but it didn’t ease the worry twisting my stomach.
I’d made my bed. Now I had to find out if I could sleep in it.
Chapter Nineteen
FORD
Iwatched Paige follow Hope out of the office, trying to calm the twinge of nerves. Hope was straightforward. She wouldn’t have told Paige everything was fine and then taken her off to fire her. Still, I couldn’t help but worry. I didn’t like seeing the anxiety in Paige’s eyes as she left.
I looked back to see Hawk standing beside Griffen’s chair, scanning through the letters, comparing them to the postcards.
“Definitely not the same handwriting,” he said. “How the fuck did we miss Paige’s connection to Sarah?”
“Because Paige didn’t lie,” Griffen said. “She held back some information. But there’s no link between Paige McKenna and Paul Williams aside from her birth certificate, and even if we’d pulled that, it wouldn’t have meant anything to us.”