Chapter 30
Singing River Hospital
Adeline sat in the molded plastic chair in the deserted waiting room. The smell of pain and sickness had invaded her lungs. She felt cold. The stupid Christmas tree in the corner mocked her.
It was the day after Christmas and she’d done this to her mother. She truly was a bad daughter. A really bad daughter.
All these years she’d thought she had escaped the evil Cooper genes, but she’d been wrong.
Heart attack. Her mother had suffered a heart attack. Not a massive episode, the doctor had assured during the brief update Adeline had gotten half an hour ago, but enough to admit her mother for additional testing and further observation. Just in case.
As soon as Irene was settled Adeline could see her. They’d run her out of the ER exam room because her presence seemed to distress the patient.
Bad, bad, bad. She was a bad daughter.
“This isn’t your fault.” Wyatt sat down next to her and shoved a cup of coffee her way.
“You weren’t there.”
“I didn’t have to be.” He gave up and set the coffee on a table next to a stack of out-of-date magazines. “You love your mother. Your mother loves you. Nothing you said or asked prompted this event. You have to know that.”
Adeline felt numb, yet the sensation of devastation hovered around the edges of her consciousness. It was there. Coming, like a hurricane brewing offshore.
Her mother could’ve died. Still could. The doctor had admitted after relentless interrogation that part of the reason for the observation was because many times a second heart attack followed the first. It reminded Adeline of the aftershocks of an earthquake.
Only this wasn’t someplace she’d never been or people she didn’t know, this was her mother.
This was her fault.
“God.” She braced her elbows on her knees and put her face in her hands. All of this was so damned wrong. Off somehow, and it just kept getting more and more twisted.
“Addy.” Wyatt’s big, warm hand settled on her back. “The doc said she’s going to be fine. You have to believe that. And stop blaming yourself.”
Adeline sat up, turned her face to his. “She’s hiding something from me.
” She looked away, didn’t want him to see the sting of tears in her eyes.
She swallowed back the ones crowded in her throat.
“There’s something about the past and this case that she’s not telling me.
I saw it in her eyes . . . before.” She blinked back the emotion that threatened to spill past her lashes. “Whatever it is . . . it’s big.”
Bigger than maybe Adeline wanted to know.
This case—coming back here—had ripped apart the fiber of her existence. And the split just kept getting wider and more jagged.
“Ms. Cooper?”
Adeline’s attention swung to the double doors next to the admissions desk. Dr. Hubbard, the physician in charge of her mother’s care, was coming toward Adeline.
She shot to her feet and rushed to meet him.
“You can see your mother now.” He smiled, the expression more comforting than he could possibly comprehend. “She’s been moved to the cardiac unit on the fourth floor. You may have a few moments with her, and then she needs to rest. She’s sedated, so she may fall asleep on you.”
“Thank you, Doctor.”
She turned to Wyatt, relief so profound rushing through her body that her knees threatened to buckle. “She’s gonna be okay.”
He hugged her close and she wanted to cry all over again. Her heart ached, needed to feel this. To feel him.
Adeline pulled away. Exiled the powerful emotions. She needed to get a hold of herself. And to get to the fourth floor.
The journey from the ER waiting room to the main lobby and the bank of elevators beyond seemed to take forever.
The delay for the elevator car to arrive was even worse.
By the time they reached the fourth floor, Adeline felt ready to have a heart attack of her own.
Her heart thumped so hard she could scarcely breathe.
Her head spun with the lack of oxygen. And all the bizarre fragments of information that didn’t fit together and yet went hand in hand.
Her mother’s cubicle stood directly across from the nurse’s station. There was no door, just a glass partition allowing visual access to the patient from the nurse’s station. As much as it scared Adeline to see her mother in a place like this, she was glad for the close monitoring.
The nurse made Wyatt wait in the corridor since only one visitor at a time was allowed. He squeezed Adeline’s hand, offering that support she needed so badly.
When Adeline approached the bed, Irene’s eyes opened. “Addy.”
Between the ultra-sterile environment, the collage of machines playing their out-of-sync symphony, and her mother’s pale face, Adeline couldn’t stop the tears.
“You about scared me to death, lady.” Her mother reached for her hand.
Adeline’s heart reacted to the too-cool feel of her skin.
“I am so sorry, Mom. I didn’t mean to upset you.
This is all my fault. I shouldn’t have—”
“This is not your fault.”
Her voice sounded so weak. Adeline’s gut clenched with fear and dread and worry, all at the same time. “I’m sorry anyway.”
Irene peered down at their clasped hands. “I shouldn’t have waited. I should have told you a long time ago.” She licked her parched lips.
As much as Adeline wanted to ask what her mother meant, she reached for the ice chips on the table next to the bed instead. “Here.” She placed a few in her mother’s mouth. When Adeline offered more, her mother shook her head.
“I need you to listen to me.”
“All right.” Adeline leaned closer to ensure she didn’t miss a word. Her mother’s voice sounded weak and fragile. Nothing like the strong woman Adeline knew so well. It tore at her heart.
“There were three of you.”
The statement ignited a new kind of fear deep in Adeline’s chest. This moment—what she was about to hear, she instinctively understood—would change everything.
“We don’t have to talk about this, Mom. You should rest. I want you well.
” She defied the tears that crammed into her eyes once more. “I can’t bear to see you like this.”
“Three beautiful little girls.” Irene’s voice wobbled.
“Your father wanted to take all three of you but there were others who desperately wanted children. I don’t know who made the decisions on who went where.
All I know is that your father and I got you.
You were so beautiful. Only six months old. And perfect.”
Adeline pinched her lips to prevent the multitude of questions to which she wanted to demand answers. She couldn’t press her mother. Just let her talk.
“I believe Cherry Prescott and Penny Arnold are the other two—your sisters.”
What little oxygen Adeline had been able to draw into her lungs bolted.
This wasn’t possible. She couldn’t be adopted.
All the times she had wondered about why she didn’t look a lot like her parents or cousins—the dreams about the water—the numerous pictures of her as a baby but none of her parents holding her until she was several months old.
Those niggling facts that had haunted the rim of her existence her whole life came crashing down around her now.
“Ms. Prescott came to see me.”
“What?” Adeline regretted how incredulous she sounded. She had to focus. Pay attention to what her mother was saying and work on figuring out the rest later. “When?”
Her mother’s lips trembled. “The same day she went missing. She wanted to see you. Wanted to know where you lived. How to get in touch with you. Somehow she’d learned that she was adopted and had siblings.
I told her I didn’t know what she was talking about.
That she had made a mistake.” Tears streamed down her face.
A sob hiccupped from her throat. “I lied to her.”
Adeline banished the questions, the shock .
. . the ache. “It’s okay,” she placated.
“You did what you thought was right. Please don’t cry.
You don’t need to get upset like this. We won’t talk about this anymore right now.
” As much as Adeline wanted the truth she couldn’t risk her mother’s health.
But, dear God—Prescott had come to her mother demanding the truth?
At least now they had some insight as to what she had been doing in the Pascagoula area.
And Adeline was adopted. Her whole past was founded on secrets and . . . lies.
“I have to tell you the rest,” Irene insisted. “I can hardly keep my eyes open, but you have to know. It may make the difference in how this turns out.”
Adeline pushed away all thought but one—her mother’s well-being. She glanced at the monitors. Her mother’s blood pressure and heart rate had climbed since she’d come into the room. “Mom, you don’t need to push yourself.”
“Just listen to me,” she urged. “The adoptions were sealed by the church.” Irene exhaled a shuddering breath. “Somehow the Prescott woman learned the truth. Apparently, someone else did as well, but I don’t know why they would do anything so awful as this.”
More tears leaked from the corners of her eyes. Adeline gently swiped them away. Her fingers trembled in spite of her best efforts.
Her mother’s gaze searched Adeline’s, then grew distant as if she were looking back, remembering. “They’re dead. I don’t know why she had to do this now. After all these years. But she just kept saying that she had to know.”
Adeline tensed. Was she talking about Prescott and Arnold? How could she know this? “Who’s dead, Mother?”
“Your biological parents.” Irene blinked, looked into Adeline’s eyes once more. “I didn’t want to tell you any of this.” More of those tears spilled. “I didn’t want you to know that you weren’t my little girl.”
“Mom,” Adeline urged, “that’s completely—”