Chapter 1
The Boy Beside the Curb and the Silver Heart
The little boy was weeping alone beside the curb when Maya found him.
He looked as though he had wandered out of another life. A tiny black tuxedo clung neatly to him, his polished shoes shone beneath the gray city rain, and his bowtie sat crooked at his throat. His tear-filled eyes searched every face that passed.
Cars swept too close.
Strangers kept walking.
Only Maya stopped.
She was twelve years old, thin under an oversized coat, with dried mud along her sleeves and two untidy braids falling against her cheeks. In one hand she held a bouquet of red roses, the flowers she had been trying to sell since morning.
She crouched before him with care.
“Are you lost?”
The boy hiccupped through his crying.
“Mom…”
Maya looked toward the traffic, then down at his shaking hands.
“It’s okay,” she whispered. “I’ll help you find her.”
He reached for her at once, as if kindness were the only familiar thing left in the world.
Maya wrapped her cold fingers around his warm little hand and led him through the crowd. She asked softly, again and again, whether anyone had seen a woman searching for a child.
The boy cried the whole way.
So Maya gave him one of her roses.
“Hold this,” she said, trying to smile. “It helps when you’re scared.”
He clutched it tightly against his chest.
Two streets later, a woman in a cream lace dress came rushing toward them in heels. Her face was frantic, and her expensive handbag swung wildly at her side.
The child’s face brightened.
“Mommy!”
Maya smiled in relief.
“I found him near the road,” she said. “He was crying, so I—”
The woman seized her son and pushed Maya’s hand away.
“Stay away from my child!”
Maya stumbled backward.
Her bouquet fell into a dirty puddle. Red roses scattered across the wet pavement, and the woman’s heel crushed them underfoot.
Maya went still.
Those flowers were all she had. She had promised herself she would sell enough to buy soup for her sick grandmother before nightfall.
The boy began sobbing again.
“No, Mommy! She helped me!”
But his mother held him tightly against her dress and stared at Maya as though torn clothing were proof of danger.
“You expect me to believe you were helping him?” she snapped. “A girl like you sees a well-dressed child alone and thinks she can get money from his family.”
Maya’s chin trembled.
“I didn’t ask for anything.”
“Then leave.”
Slowly, Maya knelt in the rainwater and gathered the ruined roses.
One by one.
Petals stuck to her dirty palms. Broken stems bent between her fingers.
The little boy struggled in his mother’s arms.
“She gave me the flower! She held my hand!”
Maya picked up the last broken stem and lifted her tear-bright eyes.
“I brought him back,” she whispered. “You broke the flowers.”
Something in her voice made the woman go still.
As Maya reached for a rose near the woman’s shoe, the collar of her old coat slipped open. A small silver pendant fell into view.
A tiny heart, split down the middle.
The woman stared.
Her grip on her son loosened.
“No…” she whispered.
Maya quickly tucked the pendant back inside her coat.
The woman took one trembling step closer.
“Where did you get that necklace?”
Maya drew away.
“My mother left it for me before she died.”
All the color drained from the elegant woman’s face. Slowly, she touched the matching half-heart pendant hidden beneath the lace at her own throat.
The little boy looked from one to the other.
“Mommy?”
The woman’s lips trembled.
“What was your mother’s name?”
Maya swallowed.
“Anna.”
A sob escaped the woman’s hand as it rose to her mouth.
Because Anna was the younger sister she had been told had died twelve years earlier, with the baby daughter no one had ever allowed her to meet.
She looked at the poor girl kneeling among ruined roses and whispered, “Anna’s baby was named Maya.”
Maya froze.
May you like
The woman sank to her knees in the puddle beside her.
Before Maya could move away, she cried, “You’re my sister’s little girl.”
