The Darkest Sunrise (The Darkest Sunrise #1)

He intertwined his fingers before resting them on his stomach. “Your mom says you were dating someone.”

I ignored the pang in my stomach at the mention of Porter. Over the last two weeks, I’d done everything I could not to think about Porter Reese. I was good at compartmentalizing. I’d been doing it for years, yet no matter how hard I tried, that man always seemed to weasel into the forefront of my brain.

I was amazed by how many times a day I would stumble across something that would remind me of him.

At first, it was things like dogs, burgers, and cocktail napkins. But it was getting out of control. Now, it was like men, a hand, or, hell, even just a person.

Fine—literally everything, including the darkness when I closed my eyes, reminded me of Porter.

I could only imagine the prideful smile that would have split his sexy mouth if he knew how often I thought about him. He would have laughed a deep, throaty chuckle that…

Yeah. I couldn’t think about Porter.

But he wasn’t even the biggest of my problems.

The day after Porter walked out of my office, I went to the park where Lucas had been abducted. I didn’t know why. It had been years since I’d tortured myself with that place. Sitting on that bench, I cried tears from my soul, watching mothers pushing their babies in strollers.

Ten. Fucking. Years.

And I hadn’t stopped there. After I’d left the park, I’d driven to my old house. The one where my little boy had slept safely, his grunts and coos echoing through the monitor. I’d moved out of that house less than a month after he’d disappeared, but as I stood on the corner, staring at the chipping paint on the blue front door, I called up the memories of the day I’d last walked out of it. And it wasn’t the day I’d moved. No. Charlotte Mills had never returned to that house after Lucas was taken.

I had—a poor, pitiful excuse for the woman I used to be.

Porter had told me that he’d never reemerged from the water the day of the accident.

I couldn’t help but wonder who he’d left behind. And then I wondered if it was possible to get that person back.

Because I desperately needed to find Charlotte Mills again.

By the time I got home that night, I was crying so hard that I threw up. But that didn’t stop me from going back the following night.

And the night after that.

And the night after that.

Each one ending worse than the last.

Something was seriously wrong with me.

Something worse than Porter Reese.

Something I feared I wasn’t going to be able to come back from.

I was losing the only bits and pieces of myself I had left.

“I’m fine,” I assured Tom with a smile that I was positive looked no less genuine than it felt. “You and Mom need to stop gossiping like schoolgirls,” I added dryly, picking my glass of wine up. (Coincidently, it was the same Sav Blanc Porter had ordered for me at his restaurant. Not so coincidently, I’d specifically ordered it when I had seen it on the menu. See? That guy was everywhere.) “Wait…when did you talk to Mom?”

He cut his gaze to the door in the most unlike-Tom way possible, and I snapped my fingers to bring it back to mine.

“Um…hello? Are you two talking now? Like, on the regular?”

“We’re”—he paused, resting his elbows on the table and steepling his fingers under his chin—“worried about you.”

I rolled my eyes. “Bullshit. She’s worried about me. You’ve seen me at least half a dozen times since my date with Porter and haven’t said anything. You’re worried about her being worried about me.”

The corners of his lip twitched as he confirmed, “And that.”

I set the wine back on the table and caught the eye of the waitress, silently asking for a check.

Tom reached across the table and covered his hand with mine.

My heart stopped and somehow exploded all at the same time. It wasn’t an odd gesture for Tom. It’s just that it was a very Porter gesture from Tom.

I snatched my hand away. “I’m fine.”

He narrowed his eyes and slanted his head. “See, I’m not thinking you are.”

“Okay, well, you’re allowed to think whatever you want. But worrying won’t change anything. I’m fine. Seriously.” I did my best to ignore his scrutinizing gaze by lifting my purse into my lap and digging through my wallet for my credit card.

His voice was rough and pained as he said, “I’ve been there, Charlotte.”

I jerked my head up to look at him. “What?”

He leaned toward me and whispered, “People. We get stuck in a rut and begin to believe the rut is how it’s always going to be. But it’s not. You just got to find your way out.”

“I went on one date with a guy, Tom. We mutually agreed not to see each other anymore. That rut you think I’m in isn’t even a divot.”

He shook his head and tsked his teeth. “Got my hopes up. Thought you’d finally done it.”

“See, this is why I don’t tell Mom anything. I go on one date and you two are out shopping for wedding china.”

“We saw you,” he said, his voice thick with emotion. “Shit, Char. You were smiling and laughing. I have never in my life seen you like that. Your mother burst into tears, cried all over a fifty-dollar steak.”

My mouth fell open as I abandoned my search-and-rescue mission for my credit card and set my purse aside. “What are you talking about?” Though it was pretty damn clear. I’d only been to one place recently that served fifty-dollar steaks.

“I finally drew up the courage and asked her out. Managed to swing a late reservation at The Porterhouse. Walked in, your mom on my arm, feeling like a goddamn king. Then we saw you.” He chuckled. “For the next hour, I paid nearly two hundred dollars on wasted food to spy on you from a booth across the way.”

Of course they had seen me with Porter. There were at least a thousand restaurants in the greater Atlanta area. Obviously, they would pick The Porterhouse. Karma wouldn’t allow it any other way.

“Fantastic,” I deadpanned.

“Yeah, Charlotte. It really was.” He stood and pulled his wallet from his back pocket. Then he threw a stack of bills on the table. “You’re not okay. No fucking way you’ll ever convince me of that. Not after I saw that woman at the restaurant.”

And then he was gone.

I groaned as he disappeared around the corner.

He was right. I had been okay that night with Porter. I felt it all the way down to my bones. But maybe that was exactly the problem I was having. I’d gotten a taste—the tiniest sampling—of happiness and I couldn’t seem to settle back into my life of isolation.




I jolted awake at the sound of my cell phone vibrating across my end table. It was dark outside and my body screamed, objecting to the wakeup call. God. How long had I been asleep? It’d been pouring when I’d left the restaurant, so I’d gone home to wait it out before heading up to the park. Though, the second I’d hit my couch, exhaustion had won out.

After snatching my phone up, I pressed it to my ear. “Hel—” I paused to clear my sleep-filled throat and tried again. “Hello.”