My Son Spotted His Missing Father Four Rows Up On Our Flight—The Wrist Scar And One Nervous Habit Gave Him Away, Then A Woman Hugged Him And Called Him Marcus

The next day I tried to give Owen the vacation I'd promised him.

We walked the riverfront. We ate shrimp and grits at a table outside. We went to the aquarium, and he pressed his hand flat against the glass while a ray drifted past.

The whole time I told myself I needed proof before I did anything I couldn't take back. Maybe there was an explanation I hadn't thought of. Maybe he'd hit his head and lost years of his life. Maybe someone dangerous had been after him. The mind will build a person all kinds of soft excuses when the heart is scared of the obvious one.

That evening Owen was watching cartoons, and I stepped out onto our little balcony for some air.

Then I heard his voice come up from below.

"Bianca, I already told you — I'm not dropping another thousand dollars because you decided overnight that you hate the earrings you picked out yesterday."

I went stiff from my jaw to my knees.

I leaned over the railing. One floor down, on the next balcony, Adrian stood with the blonde woman from the plane.

She crossed her arms. "You promised me Savannah would be romantic."

"It is romantic."

"Not when you argue about every dollar I spend."

He let out a long breath. Then he said the thing that killed the last little doubt I had left.

"One of these days you're going to figure out that being pretty doesn't fix every problem in your life."

My hands closed hard around the iron railing.

He'd said almost exactly that to me once. It was a few months after Owen was born, when I told him I was thinking about going back to work. I was wrung out and unsure of myself, and instead of telling me I could do it, he'd smiled and said something just like that.

I'd carried that sentence for years.

No stranger could have handed me that line.