“You’re silly, Uncle Josh.”
“He sure is.” Maggie stepped away. “We’ll be right over there.”
Josh and Maggie moved outside the barricades while the ride filled. By habit now, she searched the shrinking crowd. “I know running into him again was a long shot, but I was hoping someone would recognize him.”
“Me too. I feel like we’ve been here for a week.”
“How will we find him?”
“We could post his picture around town.”
“What if Erin saw it? I don’t want to bring her into this. It’s awful—this uncertainty and fear we might never have answers.” Hopelessness swept over Maggie, making her eyes burn.
Josh wrapped an arm around her shoulders, pulling her close. “Hey. We won’t give up. It’s only been one night.”
The familiar woodsy smell of his aftershave comforted her. “I know it can’t be him. But at the same time I’m so afraid of finding out for sure it’s not.”
“I’m right there with you, honey. I’ve stared at that photo till I’m cross-eyed.”
“Did you know the chances of a stranger looking just like you is one in one trillion?” Finding that statistic had only buoyed her hope that this man could actually be Ethan even when reason told her it couldn’t be.
“Maybe he’s not a stranger, per se. He could be some long-lost relative. Someone could’ve donated sperm, or, God forbid—” He pressed his lips together.
“What?”
“My dad could’ve had an affair.”
Maggie shook her head. “No way. Your mom and dad are so in love. Plus, he’d never do that.”
“I know. I’m just tossing every possible idea out there.”
“Maybe your mom had twins.”
“And didn’t realize it?”
“I guess that is a little outlandish. All I know is we have to find him. I have to know for sure.” She scanned the crowd. “But it’s like the tide washed him up onshore, then took him right back out to sea.”
“I was thinking earlier... Maybe we could approach this from a different angle.”
She looked up at him. “Such as...?”
“Let’s just suspend all disbelief here and say that man really is Ethan. What possible scenario would have him here in North Carolina and not knocking down your door? Why would he be here if not to reunite with his family?”
It seemed too ridiculous to even consider. But they needed to cover all their bases. “I’m not in Fayetteville at the moment and your parents sold their old house. You and Erin have moved.”
“He could’ve called us, though. And he knows where I work.”
True. She’d actually mulled this over all afternoon, in between calls to her mother—whom she still hadn’t heard from. “He could have amnesia.” She felt silly saying it out loud.
Josh gave her a wry grin. “Does that actually happen outside of rom-coms?”
“I know, I know. You’re the one who said to suspend disbelief.”
He nudged her. “You gotta stop reading those romances.”
“I did.” For three whole years after she’d lost Ethan. It was too depressing to remember what it was like to have a lover. “But come on, a girl’s gotta have hope.”
“More like a fantasy.”
