Only the eyes were different. They were green and piercing. Just like Jasper Garth’s.
In that moment, something inside her went completely cold. Her throat tightened so much it became hard to breathe.
Nina hadn’t wanted to see this.
Jasper’s face flashed before Nina’s eyes — the image she’d dreamed of erasing from her memory. Sharp cheekbones. A cold, piercing stare. She remembered him too clearly, as if they hadn’t been apart for twenty years at all, as if they’d only parted a couple of days ago. And now she saw his features in her daughter.
A shiver ran through her.
Her fingers pressed the lock button without her realizing it, the screen went dark. She clutched the phone to her chest, squeezing it until her fingers went numb. Tears burned in her eyes, but she didn’t cry.
She just needed to drive. Anywhere. As long as she didn’t sit still. As long as she didn’t drown in these thoughts, didn’t sink deeper into the spiral of pain that was already tightening around her.
Nina started the engine and slammed on the gas.
The road blurred before her eyes. She didn’t think about where she was going. She just pressed the gas and followed the flow of traffic until something inside led her exactly where she’d been drawn all along.
She stopped only when she realized where she was.
A quiet neighborhood. Narrow streets lined with townhouses, neat little yards, cars parked in tidy rows by the driveways.
And one of those houses was Lynn’s.
From the look of the area, money clearly wasn’t a problem for her. Which meant Nina’s help wasn’t needed. She should leave. Right now. But she didn’t.
Nina killed the engine but stayed in the car. She just stared at the house in front of her. Warmth and cold twisted strangely in her chest. For so many years she’d shoved any thoughts of her daughter deep down inside her. Sometimes she’d allowed herself to imagine their meeting. But now, sitting in the car just a few yards away, she had no idea what to do.
She didn’t know if Lynn even wanted to see her. And the scariest part was what she’d say if Lynn saw her first. She couldn’t tell her the truth. Pretend to be some distant relative? Ridiculous. Say she was lost? Just as absurd. And why had she even decided she could meet her at all? Lynn might live in another city and only have this address on record.
Nina sat in the car for what felt like forever. The clock on the dashboard said only twenty minutes had passed, but it felt like time had frozen.
She didn’t understand why she’d come.
What she wanted. What she was waiting for.
There was no answer.
She closed her eyes, rested her forehead against the steering wheel, and breathed heavily, trying to calm the chaos in her head. But the anxiety wouldn’t loosen its grip. Her chest felt tight. Her temples throbbed.
Nina exhaled hard, clenched the wheel, tore her eyes from the house and looked back at the road and suddenly noticed a tiny ball of fur right in the middle of the street.
A kitten. Small, fluffy, snow-white, with dark little spots on its ears.
It sat huddled miserably against the asphalt, trembling. Its tiny paws twitched faintly. It was cold — probably freezing.
Nina straightened sharply. How had it ended up here? The kitten looked like a pedigreed cat. Lost? Thrown out? She scanned the area, but there was no one around. The street wasn’t busy, but if someone came speeding through, the little thing wouldn’t survive.
Without thinking, Nina flung the door open and jumped out of the car. The cold evening air hit her in the face. The kitten was still sitting there, as if it were afraid to move. She approached slowly, carefully, crouched down, and held out her hands.
“Hey, baby… what are you doing out here?”
It looked at her with huge blue eyes, and something in her chest clenched painfully. Nina gently picked it up and felt the frantic hammering of its tiny heart.
And at that very moment, a door slammed behind her.
Footsteps sounded. Nina froze. She slowly turned her head… It was Lynn.
She stood in the doorway. Slim, beautiful, young, with long fair hair. Exactly like in Leonard’s photo.
