Chapter 3

Eyes ringed with black circles and bleary from lack of sleep—reluctantly sharing a bed with a restless four-year-old tended to have that effect on some people—Kay padded out of her old bedroom the following morning on bare feet and quietly pushed the door shut behind her. Across the hall, her dad had just emerged from Charity's old room, looking even worse for wear. "Dad," she acknowledged.

"Kay." Sam's voice sounded an octave higher even to his own ears. Rubbing a hand through his wayward hair uncomfortably, he couldn't keep his eyes from darting down the hall where Grace had yet to materialize, and he rambled off the first excuse that came to mind. "I…uh, I didn't want your mother to catch the cold I have." He coughed for added effect. "You know she hasn't been feeling well exactly."

Kay didn't buy his excuse for a split second, but she remained mum on the subject, her only answer the arching of a thin black brow.

Coughing awkwardly again, Sam motioned for her to precede him down the hallway. "Come on," he fell into step behind her, wincing as the top step creaked beneath first Kay's weight then his own. "I'll make you a cup of coffee. You look like you need it almost as much as I do."

"Thanks, Dad," Kay muttered dryly, feet thudding lightly against the stairs as she descended them. A few minutes later, she slumped into a chair at the kitchen table, hooking her ankles around its legs and drumming her fingers absently against the tabletop while Sam puttered around the kitchen, scratching his head in thought as he searched the cabinets for the last of the coffee.

"How's school?" he asked the oft-asked question as he measured the coffee beans and placed them in the machine.

"School's school," Kay shrugged noncommittally. "How's work?" she asked her own standardized question. Somewhere along the way she'd stopped being daddy's little girl, and he'd stopped being her perfect father figure. She mourned the loss. Still, she accepted the change. People grew up, grew apart. Families dissolved. Even hers it seemed, despite her parents' attempts at keeping up appearances.

"Work's work," Sam sighed, clinking two coffee mugs together as he withdrew them from the cupboards. Settling them and the creamer and sugar onto the table in front of her, he frowned when he noticed where her attention had drifted—to Charity and Miguel's latest postcard tacked onto the refrigerator next to Hope's newest crayola masterpiece. "Connecticut," he answered the unspoken question in her eyes. "Pretty, isn't it?"

"Looks like something I saw on t.v. once," Kay replied, giving him a too bright smile. Tucking her hair behind her ears, she resisted meeting his eyes, not wanting to see the pity there. It'd taken a hard smack of reality upside the head to make her realize Miguel would never love her *that* way. Unfortunately, the moment of proof hadn't been a private one. Remembering the tears she'd shed and the pleas she'd made a little over a year ago, Kay wanted to crawl beneath the nearest rock and hide. It was a little unnecessary when every last one of the short list of people she'd called friend had moved away and left her far behind. She was still tracing the pattern of the red and white checks on the tablecloth when her mother entered the kitchen, Hope's arms draped over her slender shoulders. She watched her mom transfer the sleepy little girl into her father's arms, careful to avoid any unnecessary contact, and the air in the small kitchen suddenly grew too stifling, her lungs short of oxygen. Blurting out the first silly excuse that came to mind, she escaped from the kitchen to the back yard and curled her legs beneath her on the creaky old swing, steadfastly ignoring the chill in the morning air as she wiped at the tears she felt stinging the corners of her eyes with the back of her hand.

No one ran after her.

She hadn't expected them to.

It was just another thing they didn't talk about—not with words anyway.

They let their actions speak for them.

Every couple of months a package arrived in the mail. Sometimes it was just a bundle of letters. Other times, there'd be pictures. Once, there'd even been a videotape, but only the once. Never was there a return address.

Luis hadn't mentioned the fact that he'd had some guys at the station take a look at the videotape to see if they could pinpoint a location, anything that might give him a clue where Ethan and his little sister were, but he had a feeling his mother knew by the dejected slump of his shoulders when his efforts had yielded no results.

A package would come in the mail, his mother would pore over every word, trace her fingers over every inch as if by touching Theresa's words she could somehow physically touch Theresa herself, and memorize them, and a few days later, the letter, the picture would magically appear where Luis would stumble upon it.

This morning his niece's blue eyes had stared at him over a pair of ridiculously large sunglasses from the dashboard of his jeep.

It'd taken several miles before the aching tightness in Luis's throat had lessened, and it only disappeared in agonizingly slow-passing increments of time when he'd pushed the jeep door open, his feet shifting in the night-cooled sand as he sought out the water's edge.

"Dear Mama…" Theresa wrote.

"You better not be reading porn," Hank warned as he wandered into Sheridan's kitchen, dressed in boxers and the same wrinkled tee-shirt from the day before.

Bare legs peeking out from beneath the pink silk robe wrapped around her body, Sheridan was completely engrossed with something on the screen of her laptop.

Hank being, well, Hank, had to find out what was so fascinating that she'd not bothered to respond to his baiting with a smart-aleck remark or barb of her own. Sidling up behind the barstool she was perched on, he peered over her shoulder, slightly disappointed to discover she was only perusing her email. Most of them, it turned out, were from Ethan. "Damn," he swore softly as he spun on his heel, searching through her cupboards for a clean glass. "Thought I had caught you in the act."

"Hank," Sheridan muttered.

"Yeah, Princess?" Hank replied after downing his glass of orange juice in one long gulp.

"Shut up."

"Touchy," Hank cracked a grin, picking up the morning newspaper from the kitchen table and skimming its pages as he paused in front of the picture window to stare at the Crane Mansion, looming forebodingly in the horizon and appropriately blocking out the morning sun's brightest rays. "What's for breakfast?"

Arching a disbelieving brow at him, Sheridan indicated the toaster next to the refrigerator. "There's bread. Make yourself some toast. I don't care much for scrambled eggs anymore."

Wincing slightly, Hank doubted she realized the sting of her own words. "Any new pictures of the munchkin?" When Sheridan waved him off with an impatient hand, he muttered under his breath, "Somebody sure is grumpy today."

"Dammit, Hank!" Sheridan finally snapped.

"Whoa, hold up now," Hank felt his anger rising then abruptly fading into concern when he noticed the ashen pallor her face had taken on. "Sheridan?" Crossing the room to her in three easy strides, he took the trembling hand she blindly struck out. "What the hell are you looking at that has you so…"

"Hank," her voice escaped in a strangled whisper as the hand he held encased in his own clutched convulsively at the fabric of his tee-shirt. "Hank," she pleaded, her eyes begging him to tell her she was seeing, imagining things. "Tell me…it's not true. Tell me it's not true," she keened as he pulled her away from the computer and into a tight embrace.

Hank felt the world drop out from under him as he registered the words on the screen.

There had been an accident.

Hope I cleared up some confusion with my last author's note (see previous chapter). If there are any more, don't hesitate to ask. :)

So...somebody finally knows that something's happened to Ethan/Theresa. About time, huh?

Hope you are enjoying the story.

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Thanks so much for reading!