Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 68033 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 227(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68033 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 227(@300wpm)
He leaned down to whisper something against her stomach; something she couldn’t hear. Something between him and the child they had made. He looked up and hesitated before standing and dropping a kiss on her cheek. And then he walked away.
Chapter Two
Tell me again why we’re registering at Walmart?” Kerris’s best friend and business partner, Meredith, pulled into a spot in the crowded parking lot and rolled her eyes.
Kerris laughed, climbing out carefully, still unused to the additional pregnancy weight she’d gained over the last five months. Nearly seven months’ pregnant in the dead heat of summer. She wouldn’t recommend it.
“A lot of ladies coming in the shop want to buy things for the baby. I registered at all those froufrou places you chose.” Kerris shared a grin with her friend and wiped at the sweat on her neck. “I want to register somewhere those ladies can afford, too.”
“I guess that makes sense.” Meredith gestured to Kerris’s baby bump. “And we still don’t know blue or pink, huh?”
“No. Cam and I want to be surprised.”
“You’ve had a great pregnancy.” Meredith smiled, the delicate bones of her face and exotic eyes giving away her Asian ancestry. “I know ladies who were sick the whole time, and who gained so much weight they were barely recognizable. Though I barely recognize you anymore with the short hair. Have you gotten used to it yet?”
Kerris reached up to touch the soft hair curling around her neck, falling just shy of her shoulders. She had cut it a few months ago to honor Iyani. The little girl from the Walsh Foundation’s Kenyan orphanage had come to America battling a brain tumor. In life and after her death, Iyani had left an indelible impression on Kerris. Cutting and donating twenty inches of hair to Locks of Love was such a small thing, but Kerris had wanted to do it. Cam had gone with her, grinning and taking pictures for Facebook with his phone.
Kerris wondered which Cam would come home tonight. He vacillated from the delighted daddy-to-be to the wronged husband who couldn’t quite manage to forgive or forget her transgression.
“I’m gonna grab a cart,” Meredith said. “There’s always something you need at Walmart.”
Kerris was studying a display while she waited for Meredith when she noticed a woman just a few feet away, checking and highlighting receipts for customers exiting the store. Kerris’s feet stuck to the floor. Goose bumps sprung up on her arms. The woman, though older, looked just like…
“Mama Jess?” Kerris asked, hesitant, hopeful, taking the few steps that brought her directly in front of the older woman.
Highlighter in hand and dark brown eyes sharpening in her still-smooth brown face, the woman studied Kerris. New lines framed those eyes, but the kindness Kerris had seen as a child was still there. She wore an I ♥ NY T-shirt over a denim skirt.
Kerris blinked a few times, uncertain. She hadn’t seen Mama Jess since she was ten years old. Maybe her memory hadn’t served her right. Maybe her heart had leaped ahead and imagined this stranger as the woman she had always considered the mother she’d never had.
“I’m s-sorry.” Kerris stuttered, embarrassed. “I thought you were—”
“Kerris!” The woman cut off Kerris’s stilted apology.
Kerris hurled herself at Mama Jess like a cannonball, wrapping her arms completely around the woman’s neck. Strong arms encircled her, pressing between her shoulder blades and pulling her as close as her swollen middle would allow.
“I’m sorry,” Kerris mumbled through her tears, pulling away. “I’ve gotten your shirt all wet.”
“Think I did the same.” Mama Jess laughed and wiped away her own tears. “As I live and breathe, I didn’t think I’d ever see you again, Lil’ Bit.”
“I wanted to find you after…” Kerris trailed off.
The past rose up between them, tragic and awkward. Kerris’s reluctant, jumbled testimony on the witness stand had sent this woman’s brother to prison, where he had died. Because of her, Mama Jess had lost all of the foster children she’d loved so much, and was probably never allowed to foster again.
“I wanted to see you, too.” Mama Jess didn’t look away, her voice soft and sure. “But I couldn’t. I always prayed we’d find each other again, though. And after all this time…well, God knows.”
“Mary!” an impatient voice called from behind them.
A balding man, not much taller than Kerris, crossed to where they stood. His mud-brown button-down shirt strained across his paunch. Censure was all over his face and in the eyes behind his wire-frame glasses.
“It’s peak time, not time for socializing, Mary.”
Kerris narrowed her eyes at the unpleasant man. She exchanged a quick look with Mama Jess, ready to snap at him on her behalf.
“Yes, sir, Mr. Crawford.” Mama Jess offered a pleasant smile. “Just some old friends.”
“Reunions on your own time.” He harrumphed his displeasure and walked back into the store.