“What’s that?”
“Are you tough? Will you stick?”
“I’ll do both, sir. And I appreciate the opportunity to prove it.”
The bedroom walls had long since been painted over, from cotton candy pink to a soft gray that matched her mood. Claudia had shared this room with her sister Jade, and she could still see the two of them, perched atop their matching bunk beds Mac had built with his own two hands. He’d crafted desks into the bottom portion instead of beds and she and Jade had giggled from their chairs over homework, gossip about boys and all the things young girls worried over.
The beds had been moved over to Knox’s house and his son, Cody, slept in one of them. The sturdy oak had done her and Jade well and it was nice to know another generation of Coltons slept on Mac’s solid and loving work.
Instead of the bunk beds, she sat on the end of a large double, moved in after this became a guest bedroom. She still used it from time to time, as did the rest of her family.
But boy, there were days she missed those bunks.
Life had been confusing back then, in the days after her mother had been arrested, but it had been safe, too. And just like Mac’s soothing presence during her swim lessons, as long as she stayed underneath his roof, she knew no harm would come to her.
The knock came first, quickly followed by that voice. Rich and deep, it sent an involuntary shiver down her spine.
Hawk.
“May I have a minute?”
She waved him in, moving over to give him room on the end of the bed, but he chose to remain standing.
“I’m sorry for what’s happened today.” He held up a hand. “That’s not true. I’m sorry for what happened so many years ago that has made today possible.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“Maybe not, but I’m the face of it. And I’m the one who owns the responsibility for connecting the dots.”
“Maybe.” She considered the large man who stood in the doorway of her room. The weight of responsibility hovered around him and she saw the genuine grief that he was responsible for finding answers. Odd how that thin layer of regret helped her deal with her new reality.
It was also comforting to know he’d not shown up out of a sense of vengeance or self-righteousness or even some sort of professional mission. So many others—especially in the early days after her mother had first been accused—had marched through town and on into her mother’s home, La Bonne Vie, with a barely veiled sense of glee.
Hawk Huntley had simply shown up to do what was right. To make another family whole.
“Carrying the news doesn’t make it any less true that my mother created those dots.” Claudia laughed, the sound wholly unexpected and sort of creaky as it bubbled to her lips. “If I can even call her my mother anymore.”
“Nothing can change that. Nothing can change your family, Claudia.” Hawk did move forward then, taking the seat next to her on the edge of the bed. The mattress tipped with his weight and she was struck immediately by the warmth of his body and the solid reassurance of having him next to her.
“And even if you were adopted, we don’t know Livia’s reasons for it. Annalise is dead, so you weren’t simply taken from her if she is your mother. Her body was identified when it was delivered to the county morgue in Houston.”
“What was her cause of death?”
“She was never autopsied. And her body was cremated before the Krupids could claim her. But the coroner had photos and the proper proof. She did die.”
“So who rushed through the paperwork? Why wouldn’t the next of kin have been given her body?”
“One more mystery that kept the family certain something else had happened to their daughter.”
“And likely at the hands of one more public official my moth—” she stopped, amended “—Livia paid off.”
Claudia did some quick math. She was twenty-six and Livia wouldn’t have been much older than her at the time of Annalise’s death. Her mother’s crimes had begun at a shockingly tender age, along with her early marriages, the births of her children and her endless string of affairs.
Had love been a part of any of it? She wanted to think better of her mother, but Claudia doubted it. Livia’s string of romances had been about manipulation and greed and money.
The capture of her uncle Matthew had made huge news in Texas after he’d been caught as one of the state’s most notorious serial killers. And even with all he’d done, he’d counted his sister among one of the few people he’d never cross.
What did that say about all her mother was capable of?
“So what comes next?”
“Until your mother escaped from jail, the first step would have been a conversation with her. Since that avenue’s closed to us we need to see what we can find out from others.”
“She wouldn’t tell the truth, even if she was still in jail.”
That fact stung, but Claudia knew it all the same. Matthew had played similar games with his children throughout the long years he’d spent in prison, the withholding of information one more source of power.
Or believed power.
No, Livia would never voluntarily reveal her choices or what she might have done to influence the course of Claudia’s life.
“You believe that?”
“I know it. She can’t be persuaded or cajoled. And there is simply no reasoning with her. If I’m going to get the truth, I’m responsible for finding it.”
“Then a DNA test is the next step.”
“But Annalise is dead. How could we do that?”
“Her parents have mementos. And a small keepsake of her hair from when she was a baby. We have what we need to do the test. But DNA technology is also sophisticated enough to test off the grandparents, as well.”
“Then I guess that’s the next step. I want to know the truth, Hawk. I want answers.”
“Then you can count on me to help you find them.”
Midday sun streamed in through the bedroom window, backlighting him with a golden glow. The attraction she’d done her level best to ignore rose up, heightened by their close proximity and the headiness of the moment.
They’d only just met, yet the power of all they’d shared had such weight. Such tremendous heft.
It was her life. And the lives of several others that had stayed in some sort of imbalanced stasis for far too long.
And this man was finally the one who had the power to shatter that immobility.
Drawn in by the firm lines of his jaw and the stiff set of those broad shoulders, she wanted to reach out and touch him. Wanted to pull him close and lose herself for a few glorious moments in time.
How could someone who’d thrown her life into such turmoil seem so appealing? And so very, very right?
* * *
Breath suspended, Hawk stared into warm gray eyes that promised a host of things, from welcome to surrender, to the one emotion that scared him the most.
Redemption.
He didn’t deserve it and never would. He’d once been fortunate enough to have the total trust of another person. More, he’d had the total trust