“So when I finally graduated high school, the counselor lined up a summer internship at Ohio State. They were the only school still accepting applications, and I thought the farther away I was, the easier I could forget. But at night… The nights used to get to me. The girls in my dorm would wake me up throwing pillows because I would just be crying in my sleep. By the end of the semester, they all knew I’d lost a baby, and they all requested to be transferred to a different floor. It was so hard. And not even knowing, not being able to see the sweet little person our baby was growing into…”
“Jesus, Augusta, you think that name your dad had written down might be connected to the people who adopted our boy?”
Wet eyelashes framed her big whiskey eyes as she gazed at me with new intensity. “I don’t think so—I know so.”
“And this is the thing you need? To find him?”
She paused, long, quiet beats more deafening than any sound could be.
A thousand thoughts rushed through my head, knowing every one she’d probably already had. She’d had years to process all of this. I had a lot of catching up to do, but the idea that our kid still might be better off without either of us in his life was at the forefront. Sometimes fate had a way of throwing a person only what they could handle. I liked to believe that most days, but Augusta’s tears had me thinkin’ somethin’ else entirely.
“I have to know,” she finally confessed, arms wrapping around herself before I untangled her, pulling her into my arms for long minutes. My chin resting on her shoulder, I held her as her fingers clutched at my shirt and our minds ran away with us.
“I’ll do anything it takes to make you feel better,” I whispered against her sun-kissed hair.
She didn’t reply for a long time, words caught in her throat before she breathed, “Thank you.”
I nodded, rubbing her back and sensing on a primal level this woman needed to know what happened to the sun and stars that were stolen from her universe so many years ago. I understood she’d carried a burden I would never fully understand, nor could anyone else.
I’d do anything it took to help her find the missing piece.
“So, what’s our first step? Researching that name?”
Augusta Belle pulled away, a soft smile turning up her lips as she wiped at the wetness covering her cheeks. “Well…”
“You’ve already done the research, haven’t you?” I knew her, knew she wouldn’t have been able to let it go once she had a name.
Her face lit for an instant, fingers working the little cameo at her neck back and forth.
“Don’t tell me you found him?”
Her grin grew impossibly wider. “When I Googled that name, the only thing that came up was someone livin’ in Landry, Mississippi.”
My eyebrows shot up, realizing he could still be right here in this state.
“That’s not far from the school I was at, Fallon. I think he’s still right here.”
I pulled her face into my hands, training my eyes on hers, looking…for what I wasn’t sure. “You really think so?”
She nodded quickly, happy smile pulling at her lips.
“I think I found our boy.”
TWENTY-SEVEN
Fallon
“Sasquatch could step out at any moment, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised.” I turned onto Old Biloxi road, more than three hours beyond Jackson, dense old-growth forest as far as the eye could see. Not creepy at all.
That’s what I kept repeating to myself anyway.
“This is exactly what it looked like at the school I was at. I bet we’re not far away,” she mused from beside me, thighs pressed side by side, just like we’d been since the moment we’d gotten into my truck to take this journey.
561 Lucedale Court
Landry, MS
I’d memorized the address on the back of that envelope miles ago, my mind conjuring what a eight-year-old boy one-part me, one-part Augusta Belle might look like.
