He settled for leaning back against the kitchen counter.On the surface she seemed okay, but there were little signs.Her lips were too firm, and her shoulders were too stiff.The deer-in-the-headlights look was gone from her eyes, but stress still lined her brow.He hoped he hadn’t added to that.
“How are you doing?”he asked.
“Better, I think.”
“How was your day?”
“Retrospective and emotional.”She gestured to the boxes of papers and stacks of photo albums spread across the kitchen table and most of the counter space.“It’s hard to wrap my mind around all of this.”
“Did you find anything?”
She shook her head.“No, and that’s the problem.”
“What do you mean?”
Her lips tightened further as she flipped through the papers in the nearest box.“No birth certificate.No adoption papers.No announcements in the town paper.”She folded her arms over her chest.“I didn’t find any bronzed baby shoes or even baby pictures.In the oldest ones I came across, I was already a toddler.”
She blinked a little faster, and Zac felt her disappointment and her desperation.They hung in the air as heavily as the humidity outside and made him feel a bit desperate himself.He’d told her he didn’t like seeing her upset, and it had been the truth.
“Something could have happened to them.They could have been lost or accidentally destroyed.”
She sent him a wan look.She was through being coddled.
He nodded toward the albums, changing tactics.“In the pictures that you did find, were you happy?”
“Yes.”
“Hold on to that.”
She hugged her arms around her waist.Her brown eyes had never been bigger.“Tell me they’re good people.”
He knew what she was asking and what she couldn’t say aloud.Not yet.They were her sisters, and she was their missing link.
“Lexie is a model citizen,” he assured her.“I couldn’t find so much as a traffic violation on her.I did find all sorts of commendations, though—awards from marketing associations and charities.It looks like she recently started a new company with a guy named Cameron Rowe.As for Roxie, she’s a bit more…let’s call it colorful.”
“How so?”
“She’s hell on wheels,” he answered honestly, “but nothing malicious or dangerous.I get the sense that she defends herself and her turf.”
“Can you blame her?”
He tilted his head.That tone was almost defensive.In fact, itwasdefensive, and it told him a lot.“No, I can’t.Given how she grew up, her record is pretty darn clean.She works at a bar called The Ruckus.I found the billboard they talked about.I can see why it caused a scandal.”
He watched as Maxie took the information in.They’d gone through that file of information together.Roxie’s childhood couldn’t have been more different than what she’d experienced with the Millers.Still, she nodded in understanding.
That didn’t mean she was okay with what was happening.In the blink of an eye, her entire life had changed.She had different genes, different family ties and a childhood she couldn’t remember.It had her wound tight as a steel coil.Her fingers were white against her elbows, and her right foot was cocked back on its heel.If she ground it into the flooring any more, there’d be a hole in the tiling.
“Are you sure you want to do this?”
She took a deep breath and dropped her arms to her sides.“We don’t have to stay long.We can leave any time you want.”
“No, we’ll leave when you want.Just give me the high sign.”
“What is that?”
He mulled it over.“You could kiss me again.”
Her eyes popped open.
