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The lady who wore his mommy’s face frowned. “Is something wrong?”
They were the wrong words. His real mommy would have said, Those can’t be tears in my big boy’s eyes …
No, he meant to say, even if it was a lie, but when he opened his mouth, nothing came out except his own breath.
The fake mommy looked around the room. Her gaze caught on Jacey, who was standing by the door, hugging herself and crying. “How’s my favorite girl in the world?”
A tiny sound escaped Bret then. He couldn’t hold it all in. Those were his words, his, but she’d given them to Jacey.
RUN.
That was all he could think. He tore out of the building and plunged into the darkening afternoon.
By the time he got to the highway, he was freezing, but he didn’t care. He kept running.
Chapter Twenty-three
We call her Jacey now.
It was like looking in a mirror that reflected the past. Instinctively she wanted to reach out. She thought of all the things she’d forgotten. Her daughter’s first word—what had it been? What had she done on the first day of kindergarten—had Jacey climbed onto that big yellow bus all by herself and waved good-bye, or had she clung to her mother’s arm, crying, begging to stay home just one more day?
“Mom?”
The sweet fullness of that word made the memory loss almost unendurable. That she could be a stranger to this child of hers …
“Jacey,” she whispered, holding out her arms.
Jacey moved slowly toward her. Mikaela felt an odd reluctance in her daughter, but at last Jacey leaned over the bed rail. Mikaela wrapped her arms around Jacey, pulling her close. She breathed in the sweet, forgotten scent of her little girl—not the baby powder she remembered, but something citrusy and adolescent.
When she drew back, Jacey was crying.
Mikaela touched her cheek. “Don’t cry. It’ll be okay. ”
A tear slid down Jacey’s cheek. “How? How will it be okay?”
“I’ll get my memory back. You’ll see. ”
Jacey’s eyes rounded. “You lost your memory? That’s why …” She glanced at the open door.
“I’m sorry. I have some gaps is all—”
“Why didn’t Dad tell me?”
“I think they asked Julian to hold off on that. ”
“Juli—You don’t remember Dad?” Jacey’s voice was barely audible.
“Oh, I remember Julian … up to a point, anyway. Everything after I left him is kind of a blank. I think—”
“Oh, perfect!” Jacey stared at Mikaela as if she’d grown horns. “I can’t believe this. ”
Mikaela frowned. “You’re mad at me. ”
“My dad is Liam Campbell. ” Jacey clutched Mikaela’s flimsy hospital gown. “We fell in love with him a long time ago, when I was only four years old. He’s been your husband for ten years. And you don’t remember him. You only remember Julian, who never, ever called me or sent a birthday card or wanted to see me. ”
Mikaela was confused. “But Julian is your father …”