The Darkest Sunrise (The Darkest Sunrise #1)

Even if that meant facing the jagged blade of reality.

I unwrapped my arms and grabbed her shoulders, giving her a gentle shake just to be sure I had her attention. “Stop saying how you should feel. There is no right way to feel when you find out your child is gone. I don’t care if it’s been ten seconds or ten years. You are allowed to feel. You’re allowed to hurt. Hell, Charlotte, maybe that’s the key. Pretending won’t change anything. The truth will always be waiting for you. You’ve got to let it hurt, sweetheart. Let that pain in. Let it light you on fire. Let it take you to your knees. Let the avalanche overtake you. Let it break every bone in your body until you think nothing is left.” I paused and lowered my voice. “And then let it go.”

“He was my son. I can’t let him go.”

“No. You are absolutely right. But you can let go of the guilt from that day. Look, I can’t stand here and tell you that you have nothing to feel guilty about any more than I can look in the mirror and tell myself that same thing. But I can tell you that you have to let that shit go. It’s killing you, Charlotte. It’s going to be the most painful thing you have ever experienced. But you can let it go. And you have to. Because that is the only way you can move on.”

“I don’t want to move on!” she screamed, her whole body tense.

I made my voice soft and tipped my head down to rest my forehead on hers. “Yes, you do. I see it in your eyes every time you look at me. Every time you laugh at my stupid jokes. Every time you ask me that one single, solitary question about my kids. But just because I have a fucked-up past too does not mean I’m your ticket out of hell. You have to find that within yourself.”

She laughed without humor and stepped out of my reach, tears pouring down her face. “There is no ticket out of this kind of hell, Porter. And if you think that little dip in the river was anything more than you pretending to have found yours, then you’re worse off than I am.”

I blew out a hard breath and hated myself before I ever said the words. But she was about to go back into hiding, and this time, I feared she wouldn’t be coming back.

“He’s dead, Charlotte.”

She blanched, staring at me with feral eyes.

“I know you love him. And I know there is nothing you wouldn’t give up to have him back. But there is nothing you can do anymore. He will always be your son. Ten million years from now, that will still be true. But the opposite of love isn’t hate the way I always thought. It’s agony, sweetheart. And you’ve been living with that for too long. Let. It. Go.”

She blinked again, and then her whole face crumbled. “He’s my son.”

“And he loved you. Do you think—” I didn’t make it any further because her body turned to stone.

“What?” she breathed.

My eyebrows knitted together. “What, what?”

“He was a baby, Porter. He didn’t love me. He needed me. And I failed him.”

My chest got tight. Fucking hell. She didn’t know that her son loved her. I’d never forget the day Travis first told me that he loved me. Of course, I’d already fallen crazy in love with him. He was five and Catherine and I had been married for just over a year, but knowing he loved me had ignited something I hadn’t known existed inside me. Kids did that to you. They made you whole even when nothing was missing.

From that point on, Travis would always be my son. Maybe not by blood, but he was mine all the same. Love had bound us together. I’d asked Catherine that very same night if she would allow me to legally adopt him, and I’d never looked back.

And it cut me deep, knowing Charlotte never got that from her child.

“Oh, Charlotte.” I closed the distance between us and pulled her into a hug. Her arms remained slack at her sides, but I didn’t let it deter me. “Of course he loved you. You were his mom.”

Her breath hitched, and she stammered, “And…I failed him.”

“And he still loved you,” I whispered.

“He shouldn’t. I left him alone.”

“And he still loved you.”

Her legs wobbled and she circled her arms around my hips. “I chose to help a complete stranger over taking care of my own son.”

“And he still loved you.”

“Why?” she whined.

“Because, just like he will always be your son, ten million years from now, you will still be his mom. Nothing you did changes that.”

And then Charlotte Mills finally let it go.

Her knees gave out and the weight of ten years’ worth of guilt swallowed her.

She cried, mumbling unintelligible words. Some I assumed were apologies to her son. Some were apologies to me. Some were angry and aimed at the universe. Some were bitter and aimed at herself.

All of them wrecking her.

But, in some way, all of them healing her as well.

This wasn’t the end for Charlotte. It was very much the beginning.

And, no matter the cost, I was going to be there every step of the way.

After about fifteen minutes of standing, Charlotte sank to the ground. I followed her down and pulled her into my side, where she continued to cry for what seemed like an eternity.

I helplessly held her while unconditional love and guilt destroyed her.

And, during that time, I stared down at that river and let it all destroy me too.

We sat there for well over an hour. Holding each other. Grieving pasts we couldn’t change.

The same pasts that had brought us together.

And, ultimately, the same pasts that would tear us apart.





* * *





“No fucking way,” Tom Stafford growled, his hand shaking as he stared at the DNA results for the unidentified baby Johnny Doe. “This has to be some sort of mistake.”

Charlie Boucher uncomfortably rocked onto his toes. “No mistaking it. Now, before you lose your shit, I did discover a few things that I think you might find interesting.”

Tom jerked his head up and scowled.

“Right. Okay,” Charlie mumbled. “They got three different DNAs off the body. The first from the clothing. Definitely Lucas Boyd. The second from the body. Definitely not Lucas Boyd. And one from the lining of the bag he was discovered in. A woman. And this did not belong to Charlotte Mills. We got no hits in the database on it. However, the first bit I found interesting is it appears that the unidentified child is related to the unidentified woman. As in…she was his mother.”

Tom blinked, the wheels in his head starting to turn. “Cause of death?”

“It’s an old body, Tom,” he warned.

“We’ve done more with older,” Tom shot back.

Charlie shook his head. “There’s no clear cause as of yet—at least, not physically. They sent a few samples off, but it’s going to take a while to get the pathology and toxicology back.”

Fuck. He knew from experience that that shit could take forever.