Chapter 3
Grant pointed at the girl.
“Who is that?”
The girl flinched.
Scott walked behind his desk and reached for a manila file.
“Her name is Amanda Glover.”
Grant waited.
Scott swallowed.
“She’s Ashley’s twin sister.”
The sentence made no sense.
Grant stared at him as if Scott had begun speaking another language.
“That’s impossible.”
Amanda raised her head slowly.
Grant’s voice hardened.
“Ashley didn’t have a twin. We don’t have another daughter.”
“Paige gave her up for adoption eighteen years ago,” Scott said.
Grant’s face went blank.
Scott continued before Grant could speak.
“Right after she was born. Closed adoption. She never told you.”
The room shifted.
Not physically. Nothing moved.
But Grant felt the floor vanish beneath the life he thought he understood.
Paige.
The woman who had sat beside him in the cemetery that morning. The woman who had pressed a tissue to her mouth and sobbed into her black coat. The woman who had once shared a hospital room with him and told him their baby girl was perfect.
Their baby girl.
Singular.
Grant lowered himself into the other chair because standing no longer seemed safe.
“Paige wouldn’t.”
Scott’s eyes held his.
“She did.”
Amanda wiped her cheeks with both hands.
“I didn’t know,” she whispered. “I didn’t know any of this until a few weeks ago.”
Grant looked at her.
It hurt to look at her.
She had Ashley’s face, but not exactly. There were differences. Her expression was guarded in a way Ashley’s had never been. Her hair fell differently around her temples. Her voice was softer, more hesitant, as if every word had to ask permission before leaving her mouth.
Scott pulled the file open and spread papers across the desk.
“Amanda came to the station three days ago with adoption documents and a DNA test from an ancestry site. She had been searching for her biological family. She found Ashley first through social media.”
Grant’s mouth tightened.
“They were talking?”
“For two weeks,” Scott said.
Amanda nodded.
“I messaged her first. I thought she’d think I was crazy. But she answered. She was kind. She was excited.”
Her voice broke.
“She said she always wanted a sister.”
Grant looked away.
Scott pushed a printed screenshot across the desk. A string of messages. Two girls trying to bridge eighteen years in two weeks. Ashley’s name appeared again and again, casual and bright and alive.
Grant did not touch the paper.
Amanda forced herself to continue.
“We were supposed to meet that night at the quarry.”
Grant’s head turned.
“What?”
Amanda’s lips trembled.
“I was late. My car broke down on County Road 8. I called for a tow, but I didn’t have good service. By the time I got there…”
She covered her mouth.
Scott finished for her.
“The police were already there.”
Amanda nodded, tears sliding down her face.
“I saw lights. I saw people near the water. I saw them pulling someone out.”
Grant stared at her.
“I didn’t know what to do. I had never met her in person. I didn’t know if they would blame me. I didn’t know if I should tell them who I was. So I ran.”
The room went still.
May you like
Grant did not comfort her.
He was not cruel about it.
