They touched down at the Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport at a quarter past eleven that morning. After renting a car, they drove to the Greenville County Sheriff’s Department where Vaughn waited, having spent the previous night in a group foster care facility. Grady had not pressed Paige for a decision about prosecuting Nolan, which was good since she truly didn’t know what she was going to do.
Now that the moment to see her son again—after three years, six months and one day—had finally arrived, Paige was so nervous she felt ill. Pressing a hand to her abdomen and surreptitiously gulping down air in an effort to settle her stomach, she walked through the heavy glass door that Grady held open for her. They met briefly with a polite, efficient uniformed officer who checked their paperwork and led them through a narrow hallway to a private conference room.
Her heartbeat grew louder and the knots in her stomach pulled tighter and tighter with every step that she took, so that by the time Grady paused with his hand on the plain, brushed steel doorknob, she could barely breathe.
“Ready?” he asked softly.
Reminding herself that Vaughn might be ambivalent at first, she pulled her spine straight and nodded. As that heavy, metal door swung inward, she began to tremble. Grady pushed into the small, crowded room. She practically ran over him, suddenly so eager that she could not contain herself.
Everything registered at once: pale walls, pale floor, pale, rectangular table flanked by lightweight metal chairs with blue, molded vinyl seats. A green-and-white bag with some team logo printed in red sat in the center of the table, stuffed so full of clothing that it couldn’t be zipped. Two women—one young, white and plump with a brown ponytail, the other African-American, slender and slightly older—occupied two of the chairs on the near side of the table.
Across from them sat a boy, a stranger, who shot abruptly to his feet.
Paige’s first thought was that they’d made a mistake. This could not be her son. He stood at least as tall as her own five feet, with no trace of the bright copper-blond hair that had crowned her baby boy. Instead, the thick, fine locks falling haphazardly over his brows, tangling with the thick lashes rimming his warm brown eyes, was a rich auburn. Then he tossed his head defiantly, and she caught a glimpse of a jagged scar just above his right eyebrow, the scar he’d gotten tumbling headlong off the porch into the shrubbery.
“Vaughn!”
How she got around the table she didn’t know, but when she threw out her arms, he flinched and backed away. She’d been told to expect this, and yet disappointment seared her trembling heart. Sucking in a deep breath, she forced her feet to slow.
It was like approaching a feral animal, once domesticated but now wild. He seemed uncertain, but she sensed that he definitely recognized her. Carefully, her lips quivering, she slipped her arms around him. Perhaps it wasn’t wise, but she had to, had to, hold him, if only for a moment.
“Mom,” he whispered in a voice she would never have recognized and yet somehow knew.
Only with great effort did she manage not to sob, but stopping the tears completely was impossible. She smiled through them, cupped his slender, oval face in her hands, pulled it gently forward and laid her forehead to his as she had so often in the past.
“Thank You, God. Thank You. Thank You.”
Chapter Three
Vaughn let her hold him for a time, but then the two women at the table introduced themselves, and he pulled away. The young one was a caseworker with Child Protective Services, the other a Victims Services agent with the county sheriff’s office. After making themselves known, they seemed content to sit back and observe, leaving Paige to focus once more on her son.
He had backed into the corner of the room, his arms tightly folded across his chest. It was not a good sign. Paige tried not to take offense. It was only to be expected. He’d spent the last three-and-a-half years with his father. He was bound to be confused. She couldn’t help noting that he was a handsome boy whose shoulders were already broadening, and now that she got a good look at him, she realized something else.
“You look like my dad.”
He frowned. “No, I don’t. I look like my dad.”
“You’re built like Nolan,” she agreed quickly, aware that she was tiptoeing through a minefield here, “and you have the same coloring, but that’s my father’s chin and nose you’ve got.” He bowed his head, as if rejecting anything she might say. Paige gulped and searched for some way to meaningfully engage him. “Do you remember your grandfather?”
Vaughn snorted, glancing up at her sullenly. “’Course. I wasn’t that little when he died.”
He’d been five and inconsolable. The memory of how he’d cried for his grandpa wrenched her heart. Had he cried like that for her? She wouldn’t ask, for both their sakes.
Chairs scraped back as first the Child Protective Services caseworker and then the Victims Services agent rose. “I think we’ve heard all we need to,” the VS agent said, her dark face parting in a smile that was half congratulatory, half sympathetic. “You should have some paperwork for us.”
“The desk officer has it,” Grady replied.
“Yes, of course.” She stepped forward and addressed the boy. “You take care, Vaughn. Happy Thanksgiving.”
He did not so much as acknowledge her words. The CPS caseworker skirted the table and hugged him.
“Cheer up, honey. It’s going to be okay.” He nodded glumly, but didn’t speak. She patted his shoulder and turned to Paige. “Happy Thanksgiving.”
“A very happy Thanksgiving,” Paige murmured, clasping the woman’s hand. “Thank you both from the bottom of my heart.”
“Just doing our jobs,” she said.
The two women quickly exited the room. The instant the door swung closed, Vaughn all but attacked. “What happens now?”
“We’re going home, son,” Paige said gently. “I thought you knew that.”
“I know I gotta go with you,” he declared, his voice breaking with the weight of his emotion, “but it’s not my home, not anymore. What I mean is, what happens to my dad?” He started to cry. “They got him in jail! He always said you’d put him away if you found us. That’s not right! He doesn’t belong in jail!”
“Don’t worry,” she urged, pulling him into her arms again. She couldn’t let herself be hurt by his concern for Nolan. What counted now was putting Vaughn’s fears to rest. She knew what she had to do, had known how it would be. Taking a deep breath, she firmly stated, “I have no intention of pressing charges against your father.”
“That may not be wise,” Grady warned, but she shook her head at him, convinced that she was right in this.
As much as she believed Nolan had wronged her and their son, as much anger as she’d carried with her over their separation, no good would be served by punishing Nolan legally.
“Does that mean they’ll let him go?” Vaughn asked hopefully. “I’ll leave with you if they’ll let him go.”
“You’ll
