CHAPTER 4

"H oney, we had no idea," her mother said.

"None?"

"No. Your father and I were told that you were found in an alley by someone who worked for the church. I think he was a deacon or something like that. He found you and brought you into the church, assuming a mother had left the baby there thinking that fit the safe haven law."

"She couldn't walk me to the steps, at least?" Kieran asked as she sat across from her mother, holding the cup of coffee her mom had made for her.

Kieran had called her on her way home the day before to talk about this, so she wasn't sure she'd learn anything new by stopping by her mom's house, but she'd also needed to see the woman in person, to know for sure that what she was hearing was the truth. It wasn't that she didn't believe her mom or that she didn't find her trustworthy, but she'd also believed that this woman had given birth to her for most of her life. There had been pictures of them in the hospital together and right after her parents had brought her home. Kieran had even seen photos of her mother pregnant, though only one or two, and while her mom never talked about being pregnant with her , she hadn't put that together until they told her of the adoption.

"I don't know why you were placed there, but your father and I had…" Her mom looked down at the cup in her own hands as she sat in Kieran's dad's old favorite recliner.

Did every dad have a favorite recliner? Kieran felt like a lot of them did. This one was a soft brown leather that had seen better days, but her mother had taken good care of it since his death, cleaning it with the proper leather cleaner and protecting it with a plastic cover for the first three years after his death. It was only then that she'd started to sit in it herself every so often.

"Your father and I had just lost our second baby, and the doctor told us that I might not be able to carry a baby to term. Then, one day, I was sitting at my desk at work, and my boss walked over and told me that they found an infant girl by a church and that they were considering you a safe-haven baby, which meant someone had willingly dropped you off there to be found and taken care of by someone else. He knew your father and I had been trying, so he asked me to take the case. I went to the hospital and saw you in the nursery. You were only a day old, and I just knew." Her mom smiled longingly as if wishing she were back there in that nursery. "I called your father right after, and he rushed over. Your dad had always wanted children. He wanted a whole household of them." Her mom laughed a little. "And he fell in love with you that day, too. We agreed to foster you at first so you wouldn't go to anyone else, but we were able to process the adoption very quickly. We were your parents, Kieran. We did talk about when and how to tell you, and the plan was always to share that with you when you were a teenager, but then, through work, I'd talk to kids who always wondered about their birth parents. For some of them, it stopped there. They'd just make up stories about how their moms had to leave them because they were in the witness protection program or their parents were actually royalty somewhere. They were fanciful stories and didn't cause any real problems." Her mom sighed. "Then, there were the kids that went beyond that. Some of them really struggled with not knowing where they came from or why their parents didn't want them, and it got them into a lot of trouble. We didn't want you to always wonder where you came from or think about the fact that you'd been left outside a church."

"In an alley, you mean," Kieran corrected.

"Yes. But I believe that your birth mother, if she was the one who dropped you off, meant to put you on those steps, Kieran." Her mom leaned forward a bit. "I've always assumed that she just got spooked. Maybe someone, maybe even that same deacon, came out and saw her, and she got too nervous, so she put you there, as close as she could get you to the church."

"Why didn't you and Dad have more kids if he wanted a household of them?"

Her mother smiled then and said, "We had you, and our hearts were full."

"Come on… I'm sure Dad wished for a boy or, at least, a girl who was even the slightest bit athletic," Kieran said, laughing a little herself now.

"No, he didn't, honey," her mom replied, shaking her head. "We thought we'd have at least four when we first got married, but years later, we'd still had little luck. When we finally got pregnant, I had an early miscarriage. We did try again, and I had her for six months before we lost her, but it was too hard to go through that again. We started talking about adoption instead, but then you were there, and we felt so lucky and grateful. We realized that we had you, and that was the best gift in the world. We did think about having another child at some point later, adopting again, but every time we talked about it, we would both just decide that we wanted to give you the best life we could, and we knew that we were happy. We had the full life we'd always wanted."

"Plus, had you adopted another kid, I might have had questions, right?"

"Sure, honey. But we would have handled those. We should've told you sooner, I know, but you were just such a happy kid. And you were – are – so smart and driven. You had goals. We didn't want anything to get in the way of that. When your father got sick, he wanted you to know. I told him that he was your father and nothing would change that, but he wanted you to hear the truth from him before he passed. I'm not sure if we did the right thing by not telling you when you were younger, or if we shouldn't have told you at all, but here we are: you know now. And there's more to the story than even we knew, apparently."

"And you're sure they never mentioned another baby?" Kieran asked before she took a sip of her coffee.

"Had they told us that there were two babies, we would've adopted both of you. I told you that we wanted a full house. And we never would've separated twins. I don't even like separating siblings at work when I have to put them in different homes. I know separating twins can be even worse. I'm sorry, honey. Had we known, we would've adopted her, too."

"But I never felt like something was missing," Kieran shared. "I don't recall feeling like another piece of me is out there. I read some articles last night about multiples being separated, and they all said they did feel like something was missing, even when they didn't know they were a multiple. But I never did. What does that mean?"

"I don't know, honey. Maybe you didn't feel that because you were happy."

"Does that mean those people weren't?"

Her mother didn't answer verbally, but she shrugged a shoulder, indicating that she didn't know.

"I want to meet her and know her, but she's in trouble. They think she killed someone, Mom. She's had a DUI and another arrest, and she might not be a good person."

"Honey, people get arrested. That doesn't necessarily make them bad people. I've met kids who have been arrested multiple times, but they're good people who made some mistakes. Some were even arrested for things they didn't do. Everything is circumstantial. Just keep that in mind."

"Murder, Mom?"

"I don't know the whole story. Neither do you. And arrested doesn't mean convicted . Innocent until proven guilty, remember?"

Kieran nodded and said, "It's like, now that I know that she exists, I do feel that thing. I feel like something is missing, and it won't get better until I meet her."

"They'll find her."

"After eight years? I don't know. She's been gone this long."

"She'll make a mistake. They always do, don't they? I saw a show on Friday night where this man robbed a jewelry store and gave his girlfriend some of the jewelry he stole. She worked as a courtroom reporter, and an officer saw the jewelry. The guy is in prison now." Her mother laughed. "Talk about a mistake."

Kieran laughed alongside her mom but then asked, "How did they find me and not her? The deacon, I mean. It's just… I was there. She was there. He found one of us."

"I really don't know, honey. It was an alley and by a dumpster. Maybe the second baby was hidden more or something."

Kieran's phone rang then, and she pulled it out, half-expecting it to be Diego wanting her to stop by and pick up something else. It was an unknown number, though, so she didn't answer and put it back in her pocket. She stayed at her mother's until they'd both finished with their coffees. Then, she hugged the woman goodbye and got in her car. Discovering she had a voicemail, Kieran let it play through the car speaker.

"Kieran, this is Lieutenant Easton. We spoke yesterday."

"As if I could forget," she said to herself.

"I wanted to let you know that we've had a development. The timing is… interesting, but I think we found your sister. I have her fingerprints that say there's a match but no DNA because she was arrested for misdemeanor drug possession. She's in another state. Anyway, we've asked for her DNA. She's not complying, but the fingerprint match is enough for me to get her here. I wanted you to know. I have her new mug shot, too. It's her. She's being arraigned on that charge there tomorrow morning, but they'll give her community service or probation, and we'll bring her back here to face the murder charge."

"Oh, my God…" Kieran said to herself.

"I'm not normally one to do this," Dylan's voice in the voicemail continued. "But I have a personal interest in siblings going missing. While your case is different, I'm sympathetic. I'm at a diner by the station right now. If you're interested or need someone to talk to, you can stop by. I'll be here for a while. I'm waiting on my wife."

Kieran wasn't sure what to do. She didn't know Dylan. And while the woman seemed nice, Kieran didn't know if meeting her at a diner was the best idea. Dylan could just be trying to get more information out of her. Of course, that would require Kieran to have any actual information in the first place.

"Lieutenant Easton," she said as she drove home.

"Yes, hi."

"You found her?"

"She found us, technically, but it's her."

"And she'll be brought back?"

"Tomorrow end-of-day or the next morning at the earliest."

"I want to see her."

"Of course," Dylan said. "I mean, it'll still be up to her, obviously, but I'll get you the information where she's being held once I know for sure."

"Thank you."

"And I know this is a lot," Dylan added. "It's not the same thing at all, but my wife's brother went missing a long time ago now. It's how she and I met, technically. So, I know that it's a lot, to not know what happened."

"Oh, I'm sorry. Did they ever find him?"

"We did, yes. He was deceased. We think he died the day he was taken," Dylan shared.

"Oh, God. I'm sorry."

"So was I when we found him. There is some good news, though," Dylan said.

"You found my criminal sister?"

"That, and I've got a new suspect in his disappearance."