The Truth About Comfort Cove

He paused, looked at her. Lucy put another bite of potato in her mouth. Chewed. Swallowed. And thought about a Pavlovian dog who acted automatically for the desired response.

She couldn’t think about Sandy. Or her poor baby.

“Jack was afraid to leave her alone, so he started taking her with him on his route. He’d make her hide in the back anytime they got close to a delivery so no one would report him. On that Wednesday—”

“The one when I was abducted?” There. She’d said the words. They were out there. Between them. “Skirting the issue isn’t going to make it go away,” she said as Ramsey stared at her.

He nodded. Took a bite of meat. And then said, “That day, Sandy saw you outside by yourself as Jack drove past your house on his way to the neighbors’. She was frantic, saying that you were going to be hurt. That you’d run out into the street, and fall down into the storm sewer.”

“Jack was giving us a clue when he mentioned that sewer.”

“Yes, he just didn’t realize it would lead us back to him.”

“That child. It was me?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Go on.”

He hesitated. She put potato in her mouth. Chewed. Swallowed. It didn’t feel all bad in her stomach.

“She jumped out of the van while it was still moving. Jack was frantic by then, too, thinking he was going to lose his job and any ability to support them or get her the help she needed. She made a deal with him that if he’d just let her go up to the house and make certain that someone took notice of the child, then she’d get back in the van and not make another sound.”

Setting his knife and fork down, Ramsey sipped from his glass of wine and then said, “Colton agreed. He couldn’t lose time waiting for her to go to the house, or go with her, so he told her that she could go up to the house, make sure the child was safely inside while he made the delivery, and then she was to meet him at the corner when he came around the block.

“Instead, when he came back around, there she was standing with the child in her arms.”

“Me.”

His gaze was intent. And then, picking up his knife and fork, taking them to the steak in front of hi

m, he said, “Right.”

“He panicked. Didn’t know what to do. And she gets in the van like nothing is wrong. The change in her was miraculous. She was the girl he’d known in Cincinnati. And Jack didn’t have to worry about finding the money to get her help.”

“What about me?”

“He’s been sending monthly money orders to Marie ever since.”

Which was why she’d never known about any money coming in to Sandy.

“Marie knew I was abducted.”

“Yes.”

“Jack has been supporting us my whole life.”

“Yes. He’s also spent the past twenty-five years eating himself alive over the Sanderson family losing their child. At first he told himself that Sandy was right. Here they’d had a baby murdered, when Sandy had been a great parent, and there were parents who cared so little about their children that they left them to wander the streets alone.”

“I was in my front yard. Hardly out wandering.”

“The best we can figure is that you followed Cal out the door when he left for school. He said that you always made a fuss when he left.”

Right. Cal Whittier. Emma’s brother. The Sanderson case.

“What about Cal reportedly seeing the child in his father’s car?” she asked, and realized, when she saw Ramsey’s frown, that she was doing it again. Shutting off.

“I’m like a faucet, huh? On and off. On and off.”