I'll Find You by Nancy Bush Page B

it was just that she wanted her grandson back. Tucker. Kinda had my own issues and ignored her, which is how she’d treated me most of my life. But then, some things happened and I wanted to make sure Tucker was okay too.”
    “Why are you looking for Teresa in Martinique?”
    “The e-mail trail on Victoria’s computer. Teresa tried to wipe it off, but it was still there. I got the right people to find a way in and see what was written. There wasn’t much.”
    “You know the right people.”
    “I know tech people,” he said. “The e-mail went to an Internet café in Fort-de-France. I’ve already been there but no one remembers anything and it was a while ago.”
    He was watching her closely as he gave her this information, as if expecting her to jump up and scream, “You got me!” She shook her head and said, “Still not me.”
    “You were on the pier this morning, wearing the bracelet.” His gaze drifted upward. “You didn’t even change the color of your hair.”
    “You’ve never actually met this Teresa,” she said.
    “No, but I’ve got a picture.”
    “You do?” she asked in a tone that suggested he’d been holding out on her.
    He pulled out his cell phone, touched the screen for the photo app, and scrolled until he came to a picture. He then held the phone up so she could see. Callie shaded her eyes from the bright sun and examined the image on the screen. It was a picture of a man and a woman standing beside each other in front of a rambling, two-story house with a wide, covered porch that looked straight out of the Old West.
    “Victoria said that it was taken shortly after the wedding,” he explained. “I scanned it and put it on my phone after she asked me to find you and the boy.” At her studied silence, he added, “It’s the best I could do.”
    Callie was only half-listening. The young woman in the picture was definitely not her, though she did bear a striking resemblance. It was the hair that was the same, distinctive, and their body type. Facially, it was difficult to tell as the woman was looking into the sun, squinting against the glare. Callie estimated her age in the midtwenties and as Callie herself was over thirty, she asked, “How old is this photograph?”
    “It was taken about five years ago.”
    “Well, it’s not me. I see the resemblance, but it’s not me.” It didn’t look anything like Aimee, either. “Who’s the guy? Your brother?” She turned her attention to the man in the picture standing next to Teresa, his arm wrapped protectively around her waist. He was dark, like West, with a serious face, but otherwise there was little resemblance.
    “Half brother,” he said again.
    “And Victoria’s your grandmother?” Callie asked.
    “The Laughlin matriarch,” he agreed.
    “And she put you on this quest?”
    West held out his hand for the phone. “That’s right.”
    “Maybe you should call her and let me talk to her,” Callie suggested. “She knew Teresa. She should know I’m not her, right?”
    “Maybe if she met you in the flesh. She’s in her eighties, and my phone’s not working internationally,” he said. “Tried to set it up before I left, but apparently there’s some hiccup.”
    “So, where are these tech people when you need them,” she murmured dryly as she handed his phone back to him.
    “Yeah, well . . .” He gazed around the restaurant as if seeing it for the first time. “I’m halfway convinced you’re not Teresa.”
    “Only halfway? Really?”
    “Tell me who really gave you the bracelet. Lead me down that path the right way. Convince me I’m wrong, and I’ll apologize and go away.”
    Far across the bay a flock of gulls swooped down, crying plaintively. Callie watched a ferry chug toward the Pointe du Bout terminal and silently wondered what she could say that would still keep Tucker safe. A part of her believed him halfway as well.
    She reached for her iced tea, thinking hard. She recalled the first few times she’d