Page 84 of Chasing Dreams
“In the morning?”
“Yeah.”
“That was Ken?”
“The Tender Care Center has an Amanda Bryant enrolled. She’s the right age, fits the description to a T. Ken’s sending someone to the Bryant’s’ house in about an hour to print her.”
Shaine came fully alert and sat up.
Samantha, who’d obviously been roused by the call, appeared in the dimness of the doorway. “They think it’s her?” Her voice trembled with excitement and fear. She leaned against the doorway. “Oh my gosh. They think it’s her.”
“How do you suppose the Bryants got her?” Shaine asked.
Light flooded the room. Austin sat back from turning the table lamp on. “Either they worked something out with this Rossi, or they thought the proceeding was legal. Which I doubt.” He nodded at Samantha. “Yes, they think it’s Amy.”
Samantha staggered to the edge of the bed. “All this time,” she said in a hoarse groan. “All this time she’s been gone, and now—just like that, you find her?”
“It’s not ‘just like that,”’ Shaine told her gently. “We’ve been all over the country looking for Jack.”
Samantha’s body trembled and she hugged herself. “I can’t believe it’s her. I’ve prayed for this for so long. And now I’m praying that this is not some cruel joke.”
“We can’t promise you anything,” Austin said, leaning back against the cluttered bookcase headboard. “But it’s no joke.”
“Of course not,” Shaine said, glancing at her wrinkled clothes. She crawled to the end of the bed and put her arms around the teen’s shoulders. The girl’s body trembled in her embrace.
A tear splashed the back of her hand. Her heart went out to the young mother who obviously had no support from her family. She didn’t know Samantha’s situation, but there didn’t seem to be a father in the picture. Maybe, like Maggie, she’d made a few mistakes, but she loved her baby and had been through hell the last year.
“I should call my mom,” the girl said finally, pulling back and wiping a sleeve across her face. “You’ll stay with me?”
Austin looked at Shaine. “We have three days left,” he said.
“We’ll stay a while longer,” Shaine promised.
Two hours later they got the call. Amanda Bryant was Amy Cutter. Samantha nearly fainted, and Austin helped Shaine lay her on the couch. He got her a glass of water and watched Shaine rub her wrists and talk to her. The young girl cried huge racking sobs that drained the energy from all of them.
“Can she meet us at the airport in Kansas City in the morning?” Ken asked.
“I’ll have her there,” Austin promised.
The following morning he and Shaine observed the joyous reunion of mother and child in the bustling terminal.
“The Bryants paid big bucks for that kid,” Ken said. “They claim they weren’t in on the operation, but they bought a baby that turned up out of thin air.”
Plump little Amy cried at the handling of strangers yet again and the tearful kisses Samantha rained over her rosy cheeks. Shaine felt sorry for mother and child. Even though she’d been found and returned, it had been an entire year since the baby had been with her real mother. The adjustment would be an enormous one for both of them, and it wouldn’t be easy.
She had to wonder how Jack would react to seeing her again after all this time. Children were amazingly resilient and adapted to changes far better than adults. Or was that just a fallacy created by adults to justify the changes they forced on the children?
Ken led Austin and Shaine a short distance from the noisy reunion. “The Bryants are being formally charged today. We also have one Antonio Rossi, alias Tony Reames, alias Tim Bradford in custody. He’s the top dog. And the Holbrooks have already given their statements incriminating him.”
“What about Jack?”
Ken turned to her. “Rossi has a lot of kids to account for, Shaine. It’s going to take a while to go over the missing-persons data and connect them with this guy. We’re doing everything we can. As fast as we can, but it’s a lot of data.”
She nodded and turned away. Across the lobby, Samantha and her mother comforted the dark-haired toddler. After several minutes Samantha noticed her, said something to her mother and the three of them approached.
“Mom, this is Shaine. The one I told you about. She found Amy for me.”
The woman looked like an older version of Samantha, her hair tinted a deeper auburn shade. “Samantha says she’ll never be able to repay you,” the woman said. “I never set much store by your psychic stuff, but Amy is here with us, and I’m grateful for that.”
