Chapter 2 - The Book That Fell Open
Roland was still on the floor beside the collapsed bookcase when something small slid from one of the fallen books.
Harper noticed it because it wasn’t a bookmark.
It was an envelope.
Then another followed.
And another.
Several had been wedged inside the hollowed center of an oversized decorative history volume that had split open when the shelf collapsed.
Camille saw them.
Her expression changed again.
This time, Harper recognized the emotion.
Not fear of being exposed.
Grief.
Harrison bent, gathered the envelopes, and read the first one.
The front was written in Camille’s handwriting.
For My Son — First Birthday
The next:
For My Son — Age Two
Then three.
Four.
Five.
They continued almost every year.
None had stamps.
None had been opened.
Harper looked slowly toward her mother.
“You wrote these?”
Camille’s eyes filled.
“Yes.”
“Then why are they in Grandpa’s bookcase?”
Camille looked toward Roland.
He had pushed himself upright against the remains of the shelf, but the arrogance had drained from him.
Harper turned back to Harrison.
“You said Mom signed the adoption.”
“She did.”
“And she knew he was really her baby.”
Harrison hesitated.
“Yes.”
The answer hit Harper harder than everything else.
She stood so quickly the wristband nearly slipped from her hand.
“Then she gave him away.”
Camille flinched.
“Harper—”
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
“You knew he was your son.”
“Yes.”
“And you signed anyway.”
Camille covered her mouth.
For several seconds she couldn’t speak.
Then she forced the words out.
“I signed because your grandfather told me if I didn’t, I would lose both of you.”
Harper stared.
Roland snapped from beside the ruined bookcase.
“That is not what happened.”
Camille turned on him with a fury Harper had never seen.
“You told me the hospital would call me unstable.”
“I told you you were in no condition to raise two infants alone.”
“My husband had been dead for six weeks!”
That stopped Harper.
Her father, Nathan, died in a highway accident shortly before she was born. She knew that much. What she had never known was that Camille had been carrying twins when it happened.
Camille looked back at her daughter.
“I had lost your father. I had nearly bled to death delivering you. I hadn’t slept. I could barely stand. Your grandfather kept telling me I would break.”
“And did you believe him?”
Camille’s voice cracked.
“No.”
Harper looked at the letters scattered across the marble.
“Then why sign?”
Camille’s eyes shifted to Roland.
“Because he said if I fought him, he would tell the hospital I was suicidal.”
The room went silent.
“He said social services would take both babies while they investigated. He promised that if I let one child go to a ‘safe family,’ he would make sure I kept the other.”
Harper looked down at the wristband in her hand.
One child.
Her.
The horror was immediate.
“My twin was the price for keeping me.”
Camille broke then.
“No.”
May you like
But Harper had already stepped away.
Because fifteen years of being an only child had just turned into fifteen years of someone else being missing.
