Chapter 2
I almost didn’t answer the phone.
Unknown number.
Nine times out of ten, it’s nothing important, but something made me pick up. And I think about that all the time. How different things would have been if I hadn’t. If I’d let it ring out, finished what I was doing, and checked my voicemail later.
Because that one choice, answering, was the moment everything changed.
“Hello?”
A woman’s voice.
“Is this Dana?”
“Yes.”
“There’s a little girl at my apartment. She’s crying. She gave me your number and begged me to call.”
“What’s her name?”
“She said, Ella.”
My stomach dropped.
“Put her on.”
Shuffling.
Then my daughter’s voice, shaky and small.
“Mommy.”
“I’m here,” I said quickly. “I’m right here.”
“They left me,” she sobbed. “They just left me here. They went to the beach with Paige and Lucas. I don’t want to be here.”
I gripped the counter.
“Okay, sweetheart. You’re safe. Stay with the lady who called me. I’ll make sure someone comes for you.”
Back to the woman.
“Can you stay with her while I arrange someone? I’ll call you back once I know.”
“Yes. She’ll be safe with me.”
I kept the phone to my ear, thinking fast.
My first thought was to go myself. Get on a plane, fly to Miami, collect her, but that would take hours.
By then, Ella would have spent an entire day stranded, wondering if I was coming.
I thought about calling my parents and dismissed it immediately.
They were the ones who had left her.
My sister Briana, too.
I couldn’t trust them to undo what they’d done.
So, who?
May you like
And then I remembered Paula, my aunt.
She lived in Miami.
