CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
“D etective Miller?” Rose Sanderson went right by Bill Mendholson. “My daughter tells me that you have news regarding our missing Claire?”
Lucy watched the well-dressed, elegantly beautiful woman enter the squad room and approach Ramsey. She was crying, but she did that gracefully, too.
Emma, dressed more sedately in jeans and a white buttondown blouse with a navy blue sweater that matched, came up beside her mother and gave Lucy a hug.
“Thank you for being here,” Emma whispered. Lucy hadn’t expected the hug. Her arms flew out automatically. She held on to Emma’s body—slim like hers, but taller—and when the other woman would have pulled back, she couldn’t let go. She just couldn’t let go.
“Detective?” Rose’s voice wobbled. “What do you know about our Claire?”
Lucy couldn’t open her eyes. She was afraid if she did, that beautiful woman was going to take one look at her and run the other direction. She was going to claim that it had all been a great mistake.
She wasn’t ever going to accept the woman that Sandy Hayes had raised.
“Lucy?” She heard Ramsey.
“Mrs. Sanderson, why don’t you step over here for a minute.” Bill’s voice came closer. “We have some pictures we want you to look at.”
A part of Lucy wondered what pictures they had. There were no pictures in the Sanderson file. Bill led Rose to a small viewing room next door.
“Lucy?” Emma pulled back. There were tears streaming down her face, and, Lucy realized, down her own, as well. “Is it that bad?”
“I don’t know, Emma,” she whispered, a little girl again, looking up to her big sister. “I’ve been asking myself that all day.”
“You’ve known all day? Have you seen her, then? Talked to her?”
Ramsey was right there behind here. Ready to hold her up.
“It’s me, Emma. I’m Claire.” It wasn’t planned. Rehearsed. It just happened.
Emma stumbled back and Lucy’s heart dropped. She’d had all day to prepare. She’d known that she wasn’t what they’d expect their little Claire to be… .
“You?” Emma stared. Aghast? “But—”
“Please, can we all step into this room and have a seat?” Ramsey didn’t give Lucy a chance to respond to his raised voice as he rapped on a window and motioned to Bill. With a hand on her arm, he led her into the little room where, only that morning, her life had changed so drastically.
With Ramsey’s guidance, Lucy was the first person in the room. He showed her to a chair at the table and saw her seated. Standing with his hands on the back of the chair beside her, he had Rose take the seat across from Lucy. Emma sat down next to her. Bill stood just behind Ramsey.
“Do you mind if I take this?” Ramsey asked. Bill shook his head.
“Mrs. Sanderson, I’m sorry for making you wait to hear this. There’s just no easy way to bring everyone together.”
Lucy looked at the other woman because it was easier than seeing Emma, who knew her, and knew the truth.
“I understand, Detective,” Rose said. “Just please, is Claire alive? Is she well? Can you tell me—”
“Yes, ma’am,” Ramsey spoke clearly. Concisely. But the last word was barely discernible for the animalistic cry that Rose emitted.
She didn’t say a word, though. Biting her lip she continued to give Ramsey her full attention. He continued. “I can tell you that we’ve located your daughter. She’s been properly identified through DNA records.”
Lucy heard Emma’s gasp. Ramsey probably did, too, but he didn’t even pause.
“She’s alive and well. And for the past twenty-five years, she’s been living another life, with another family. She just found out today that she is not who she has always thought she was.”
With tears running down her face, Rose said, “Oh, poor baby. My poor, poor baby.” Her gaze turned to Emma. Lucy continued to watch Rose. “Did you know, Em? They found our Claire.”
“I know, Mom.” Emma was clearly crying.
“Okay.” Rose folded her hands on the table and sat forward. “What do you need us to do now?” she asked, smiling, still crying, but focused, too. It was astonishing, how the woman could take control and fall apart all at the same time. “Tell me what she needs, Detective. Time, I assume—that’s a given. And then what? I assume she has her own place, but if she doesn’t, she can stay with Emma or me.”
“With Emma?” Lucy spoke for the first time since she’d come into the room. And Rose seemed to finally notice her sitting there.
“Yes,” the woman—her mother—smiled at her. “I’m sorry, I don’t believe we’ve met… .”
Her voice drifted off and all the color left Rose’s face. “Oh,” she said. And Lucy wanted the floor to open up.
“Oh!” Rose said again. And then, “Oh, my…”
Her hands, trembling visibly, moved slowly across the table as Emma said, “Mom, this is Claire.”
Rose’s mouth fell open. She stared. And then, with tears streaming from her eyes, she jumped up and was around the table. Ramsey was no obstacle to her at all as she pushed by him and reached for Lucy. “Oh, my baby. My Claire.” Her fingers ran lightly over Lucy’s face. They were so soft, Lucy could hardly believe they were adult hands. And they were wiping away her tears.
“Emma, come here, love,” Rose said, putting an arm around Emma and pulling her close. Lucy knew they were a real family—Emma and Rose. She understood. And then, somehow, she was with them, encircled by their arms, as both her mother and her big sister held her so tightly she somehow knew that she was never going to fight another battle alone.
“Y ou’re coming home with me,” Rose said half an hour later. She was sitting on the divan between her two daughters, holding both their hands. Ramsey had just told Emma and Rose about Jack and Sandy. It was Emma who told her mother that Lucy had grown up in Aurora, still lived there and had only arrived in town that day.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Sanderson,” Ramsey said, not to be pushed aside this time. “But she’s coming home with me. For the next few days, at least. That’s not negotiable.”
Rose frowned. “Is that proper, Detective? I mean—” “I think Ramsey and Claire are falling in love, Mom. I’ve been hoping so, anyway.”
“I’m here!” Lucy said, holding up her free hand. And Ramsey wanted to hug her in the worst way. “And Ramsey’s right. Dr. Zimmerman, the therapist who helped Ramsey pick me up off the floor this afternoon—almost literally—advised that I needed some transition time. I’d already planned to stay with Ramsey when I thought I was just coming to attend Emma’s wedding, not to become her sister.”
She looked tired. And strangely afraid, too.
“I understand,” Rose said. “And I won’t push. Too much. I’ve waited a long time to bring you home,” she said to Lucy.
Lucy wasn’t saying much—she just nodded. And Ramsey knew that she’d had enough.
It was time to get her out of there and take her home.
T he wedding between Chris Talbot and Emma Sanderson was an emotional affair—starting hours before the actual ceremony.
Ramsey and Lucy had agreed to meet the family at Emma’s house just after noon. Cal and Frank Whittier were going to be there, as well. The overall consensus was that it would be best if everyone met before they all showed up for a wedding attended by scores of fishermen and their families.
Chris and Emma met Lucy and Ramsey at the door. The four of them had spent some time together shortly after Ramsey had first contacted Emma about the missing box of evidence from her sister’s case. Ramsey had figured this meeting would be the easiest part of the day ahead.
Until he saw Emma and Lucy, after a night apart, greet each other with a hug that looked like it was never going to end, and another spate of tears.
He’d expected to be up with Lucy most of, if not all of, Friday night, but she’d been so exhausted that she’d fallen asleep in the car on the way home from the
station and had barely woken enough to know that he was carrying her into bed when they got home.
Surprisingly, considering he had a woman in his bed all night for the first time since his divorce, Ramsey had slept straight through the night, too.
“You’re the first ones here,” Chris said, his long hair trimmed and tidy.
“How was she last night?”
“Emma? A nutcase. And I loved every minute of it. She’s had too many chains around her for too long. I can’t wait to see what the woman does now that she’s free to live!”
Ramsey grinned, figuring Chris Talbot was going to have his hands full.
“How’s Rose?” Ramsey liked the woman. He’d probably have liked Sandy Hayes, too, if he’d known her heart as Lucy had.
“I hardly recognize her,” Chris said. “I’m looking forward to seeing what the future brings.”
“Just so long as it’s not little Talbots anytime too soon, huh?” Ramsey asked.
“No, I think I’m looking forward to those, too.”
“Talk about a transformation…”
“Yeah, well, watch out, man. I get the feeling you’re about to see what loving a Sanderson woman can do to a guy.”
Ramsey smiled, playing along. Even if for the day. Lucy needed him right now. It didn’t mean she’d need him in the future. Or even that she’d want him.
One step at a time, Dr. Zimmerman had told her. He figured it was good advice for him, too.
C al and Frank Whittier arrived shortly after Lucy and Ramsey did. She was nervous as hell about meeting both of them. They’d been paying for her disappearance for the past twenty-five years.
She should have known better than to worry. Her heart should have known. Cal walked into Emma’s home, took one look at Lucy and walked right up and grabbed her into a hug so tight her feet left the ground.
“Goodness, girl, you have no idea how good it feels to have you home.”
There was that word again. It kept creeping up. Rose wanted to take her home. Ramsey took her home last night. Cal was glad to see her home.
She wasn’t sure what home was.
But she wanted to find out.
“It’s good to be home,” she told the man who was almost a complete stranger to her. These people remembered her. She had no memories of them at all.
The man standing behind Cal had to be Frank Whittier. He approached her slowly, looking at her with the oldest pair of eyes she’d ever seen. And the kindest smile.
“Daddy?” The word came out without thought. Without her even realizing she was going to speak.
The room grew deathly quiet. She could feel the silence as much as hear it. Everyone was staring.
She was Lucy Hayes, the one who always knew how to fix things, the one who took care of everything, and she had no idea what to do.
She stared at the older man in front of her. And he smiled. “You remember me, Claire Bear?”
Her mind flashed. Like a camera went off. She was a little girl. Looking really far up and she saw that smile. She saw those lips move and heard her special name. “Claire Bear.”
“That’s me,” she said aloud. “I had a teddy bear…”
“Yes, you did,” Frank said, grinning from ear to ear. “I’m so glad I lived to see this day.” He just stood there, with empty arms, this man that she somehow sensed used to carry her around wherever she wanted to go.
What she wanted to do right then was hug him. So she did.
B y the time they all got to the wedding, Lucy was exhausted. She also had something she wanted to talk to Ramsey about— several things, actually, but she started with one.
“Would you still think of me as you did when we were working together if I was called by a different name?” They were standing on the deck of the wedding boat, away from the last-minute preparations, to give her a much-needed breather.
“Now that’s a difficult question to answer,” he said, his brow raised as he assessed her. She couldn’t tell if he was being serious or not.
So she played along. “Why?”
“Because I don’t think of you now as I thought of you when we were just working together, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with what you call yourself.”
“Oh.” Her face got hot again. She hated when it did that. And loved the familiarity of feeling like herself.
“Then let me rephrase that,” she said. “Would you still think of me as you do now if I changed my name?”
“You are who you are, Luce. It doesn’t matter to me what we call you. What matters to me is having you in my life.”
Turning at the rail, she looked up at him. “You mean that.”
“I do.”
“Then I have to tell you something.”
“What’s that?”
Life had shown her one thing for sure. There was no time for holding back. Things could change in an instant.
“Through all of this craziness, even with remembering Frank and starting to identify with Claire, you are my constant. I want to get to know my family. I desperately want to be a part of them. But everyone is saying home to me, wanting to bring me home, and the only time it rings true at all is when you tell me you’re taking me home.”
“And as crazy as this sounds, I’ve realized, through all of this, that you’re my home, too.”
“What do you think it all means?”
“I’m not sure yet. I mean, like Dr. Zimmerman said, we have to give you time to assimilate, acclimate.” He wrapped his arms around her hips, pulling her up close to him. “But what I think it means is that one of us is going to have to move. It’s hard to be home when there’re hundreds of miles between you and there.”
“My home is here, Ramsey. In Comfort Cove. It’s where I was born.”
“You might change your mind—”
“No.” She shook her head. “I already talked to Bill, this morning, when he called while you were in the shower. He asked Captain Winston if there’s any possibility of a detective’s position opening up in Comfort Cove.”
Ramsey grinned. “And?”
“He said he was certain that whenever I was ready to go back to work, the Comfort Cove Police Department would have a place for me.”
She was going to have to see Sandy. To come to terms with the love she still felt for the woman who’d stolen her life from her. But there was time for that.
“I have an idea,” Ramsey said, his gaze warm and open as he held her.
“What?”
“Why don’t you and I get married and then we can just call you Mrs. Miller and be done with the whole name thing.”
Mrs. Miller.
A week ago, she’d have said she was never going to be “Mrs.” anything. But, if she’d been honest with herself, she’d also have said she was in love with Ramsey Miller.
“Don’t you think it’s a little soon?” she asked.
“Do you?”
“No.”
“Then…”
“Are you proposing?”
“Yes.”
“Then, yes. I think you and I should get married.” Not because of how she felt today. Or last night. Or even yesterday morning. But because of how she’d felt before she’d ever left Aurora.
“I love you, Detective Miller.”
“And I love you, Lucy-Claire.”
“Lucy-Claire,” she repeated. “I like that. A lot.”
“No matter what we end up with, sweetie, there will always be a part of Lucy here, with us. And a part of Claire, too.”
“Are you okay with that?”
“All I need is you.”
They were the words that opened up the last lock on her heart and set her free.
EPILOGUE
O n the day Chris and Emma Talbot announced that they were expecting their first child, Ramsey and Lucy-Claire Miller announced that they’d eloped. They told her family first. Rose and Frank, who’d eloped the week before, were at home. They called Cal and Morgan from their house. And stopped by to see Chris
and Emma.
From there they got in their car, already packed with their suitcases, and set out for the long drive to their honeymoon in Florida.
They made a brief stop on the way. In Vienna, Kentucky, where Mr. and Mrs. Miller, Sr., welcomed them with tears and open arms. While they were there, Ramsey’s mother pulled him aside—to warn him to be good to this girl who was too good for him, Ramsey was sure.
Instead, she apologized for blaming him for something he couldn’t possibly have prevented. Diane could just as easily have taken those pills if Ramsey had been right there at the party with her. The choice she’d made was her own. Not Ramsey’s.
And then she asked him, again, what town he lived in now. She was fading. But she was at peace. And she loved her son.
Before they left, Ramsey promised his father, and himself, that he and Lucy-Claire would make frequent visits to Vienna from that point forward. Life was too short, and too precious, to waste.
Lucy-Claire agreed with him completely.
* * * * *
The Truth About Comfort Cove Page 27
