The way Amy cradles him against her chest, all that’s visible is his tiny face turned halfway toward us. His eyes closed, lips parted slightly as he sleeps comfortably in her arms.
Our son. Our son. Our son.
Her brow furrows as she looks at us. “What do you mean by ‘your’ son?”
She glances down at the baby in her arms, one that was ripped so violently from Willow’s only a few weeks ago.
Willow inclines her head toward Niall. “You’re holding him.”
Amy shakes her head, retreating another step until her back hits the counter behind her. “No, this is my great nephew, Earl’s grandson.”
Willow goes completely rigid beside me.
I step forward, not wanting to startle Amy, but I also don’t want to give her space to try to do something crazy like run with him. “No.” I shake my head. “He isn’t. I don’t know what Earl told you, but…”
The older woman sputters, and her gaze darts between the baby and the two of us. “He said Roberta came back with their son and that this is his grandson.”
I grit my jaw, clenching my teeth together so hard they ache, wanting to scream.
That’s a fucking lie.
There is no way Amy didn’t know what was happening, what her brother was doing to Willow…
I want to scream at her to get her hands off him, to rail at her for being an accessory to kidnapping, and even worse, but I can’t risk something happening to Niall.
My body trembles with barely restrained rage, and Willow seems momentarily stunned, watching the woman carefully as if she’s assessing how to best approach her.
Finally, Willow takes a step forward. “That’s not true, and you know it, Amy.” She inches forward another step, but the long counter between them acts as a barricade, preventing her from getting to Amy and Niall unless she takes the time to walk around it. “You know Roberta didn’t come back. You know he thought I was Roberta and that he”—she points to our son—“was the baby she took from him twenty years ago.”
A single tear slips down Amy’s cheek as she shakes her head. “No.”
Willow stands her ground. “Yes.”
We both know Earl was too far gone mentally to have realized he would need to stage a ruse as complicated as what happened with Raven. Willow said he was never lucid enough to know who he was—or wasn’t—so there is no way in hell he could have understood how essential it would be to send those notes and gifts to Raven, to get Willow to write them in her own handwriting and reference things only she could know so as to not raise suspicions.
He needed help.
From someone familiar with the town and the people in it.
Someone he trusted.
Like Amy, who knows everyone because of her work in the clinic with Doc Broward for so many years.
She retired only a few years before Willow left, would have understood her relationship with Raven—and the fact that Raven would have investigated her friend’s disappearance if she weren’t convinced she left of her own accord and was somewhere else, happy and safe.
Willow glances over at me as the tears well in her eyes, her growing frustration registering in her twisted lips, as if she’s biting back what she really wants to say to this woman, the same way I am. “We know you helped Earl, Amy. We know you arranged for the gifts and notes to go to Raven. What I need to know is why?” Her voice cracks. “Why didn’t you help me get away from him?”
I place my left hand on her lower back, ignoring the pain in my arm, offering her what comfort and support I can, while struggling to maintain my cool, despite my vibrating rage.
Goddamn that man for what he did to her, for putting her in this position…
A sob slips from Amy’s lips, and she clings to Niall, clearly having no intention of simply handing him over. “I-I…”
I barely manage to bite back the growl trying to climb my throat. “You what?”
The old woman’s brow furrows, pain flashing across her teary gaze. “I didn’t know what to do…”
It’s as close to an admission as I need to confirm everything we suspected.
