Page 56 of Breaking Emily's Rules
“It’s okay, baby. It’s okay,” Molly said, as much to Sierra as to herself. Just as she’d thought it might, her breaths came easier, and her heart felt too large in her chest. She smelled her little baby hair smell. Johnson’s baby shampoo. Molly used to wash Sierra’s hair with the same shampoo and now wondered if she still hated getting her hair wet.
Sierra continued to sniffle and look in the direction of the mayhem and the crying. She pointed in the direction of the little boy and said, “Owie.”
Then she looked at Molly like she was some kind of shiny bright thing she’d never seen before. She reached up and tugged on her baseball cap.
“This hat,” she said.
“That’s right. This is my hat,” Molly said. “You’re a smart girl, aren’t you?”
“Yay,” Sierra said and clapped her hands together. “Yay, baby.”
Molly closed her eyes and hugged Sierra tight. “My baby. I’m your mommy,” she whispered.
Sandy walked back toward them. Apparently the commotion had died down, not that Molly had noticed until now.
“Bee sting,” Sandy said. “Luckily I carry a first aid kit in my bag.”
From the way that kid was wailing, she would have guessed he’d lost an arm. “Is he all right?”
“He’ll be fine. I see that somebody likes you,” Sandy smiled. “Isn’t she the friendliest baby you’ve ever met?”
“She is.” Molly smiled and held her tight one last time then handed her baby over.
“It was nice meeting you,” Sandy said. “Maybe I’ll see you and your boys again sometime. I’ve got to get Sierra back for a nap. Dylan keeps her to a pretty tight schedule.”
“I’ll bet he does,” Molly said.
A schedule I’m about to blow up into a thousand little shiny pieces.
* * *
Stone
Stone hadn’t beenable to push off the meeting any longer. He stared at the almost-stranger across the wide oak conference table in his attorney’s office. A stranger who looked like him. No doubt, at least physically speaking, they’d both come from the same gene pool. Sarah had the same blue eyes, though they were covered by black-rimmed glasses. Her hair was dark like his, and she wore it in a bun that made her look like a librarian.
He hadn’t seen Sarah in years and thought the attorney’s office was possibly not the best place for a family reunion.
Stone’s lawyer was the first to speak. “We thought this meeting might be a good idea.” He had an annoying click in the back of his throat that punctuated the end of his sentences.
Stone didn’t speak. Good idea or not, he resented the hell out of being here. Matt was right in that they should be able to do this without lawyers. But Sarah had hired one, which forced him to hire Mark. A man he’d love to fire right about now.
“Thank you for arranging this,” Sarah said. “I haven’t been able to have an adult conversation with my brother.”
Conversation? Weren’t the lawyers going to fix this? Weren’t they on the clock? What good were they, anyway? Right now he didn’t want to talk to anyone, but Sarah least of all.
“I suggest we give you two a few minutes alone, to talk things out. No lawyers. After all, sometimes we get in the way.” Sarah’s lawyer had long red fingernails she liked to tap on the glass table. Between her taps and Mark’s clicks, it would be a small miracle if Stone could sit still for longer than five minutes.
“Don’t worry, we’re off the clock.” Click, click. Mark stood.
Within a few minutes, Stone was sitting alone in a glass-walled conference room with his sister. The stranger who looked like him.
She turned to him. “I’ll talk, since you don’t seem to be fond of words.”
Nice. He’d give her that. She got the first shot in. “Go ahead.”
“By the way, our mother’s doing fine.”
“We email regularly.” There were even a few phone calls here and there, not that he’d been a big talker. Point being, he hadn’t felt abandoned by his mother, and he couldn’t understand why Sarah had felt abandoned by Dad.
