Page 69 of Shiver

The chief pulled it off the floor and handed it to her. “Do you know who this is?”

“No, sir, but I’ve seen him.”

The chief stood. “When?”

“Just a few minutes ago, lurking around outside on the sidewalk. Right before Miss Miller left.”

Chapter 25

Devra needed answers.She tried to focus on the winding road ahead of her, but tears kept filling her eyes and blurring her vision. She wasn’t sure when it had happened,but she’d fallen in love with Riley. She’d even started to believe her life was going to be different. That she wouldn’t have to live under a cloud of suspicion and danger, that they actually had a chance at a future together.

She’d imagined Sunday dinners with his family. Going for rides on Babe, boating across the bayou, making love day and night. Fresh tears rolled down her cheeks. They might even have had children of their own. But she’d been kidding herself, and now she would pay the price.

She pulled to a stop in front of her parents’ home. This time, she wouldn’t leave until she learned the truth from her parents of who she was, and why they’d given her up and left her at the sanitarium.

She turned off the car, then ran around the side of the house to the kitchen door. Through the window, she could see her mama and papa sitting at the kitchen table, each lost in their own thoughts.

She pulled open the kitchen door. “Devra, you came back,” her mama said looking pleased.

Devra didn’t say a word, just walked into the kitchen and sat down across from them. “I need to know the truth. It’s just us now. Spill.”

Surprise and confusion crinkled her mama’s brow. “What are you talking about?”

Her papa just stared, his face a blank mask.

Devra took a deep breath, then asked quickly before she lost her nerve. “Are you my parents?”

Her mother gasped. “Of course, we’re your parents. We raised you. Your papa and I love you, Devy. I know you don’t believe that, but it’s true.”

We raised you. She looked at them both. “You’re right. I don’t believe it. Children who are loved aren’t abandoned. The chief would like to know where I was born. Where did we live before we came here? How did I break my pinky?”

Her mama’s eyes widened, her fingers fluttering up her neck to cover her mouth.

“What happened to me?” Devra asked. “What haven’t you told me? Who am I?”

“We raised you,” her papa repeated. “We tended you when you were sick, we pulled you into our bed at night when you were scared, we love you.”

“But are you my parents? Did you give birth to me? I need to know because it’s the only justification I can see as to why you dumped me off in a mental institution and never came back.”

An anguished moan ripped from her mama’s throat and her eyes filled with tears. Devra watched her, heard her, with an odd sense of detachment. A part of her knew she should back off, give her a chance to pull herself together, but she couldn’t. She’d lost too much of her life to give anymore, and now she’d lost Riley too. She sighed. “Please, tell me the truth.”

Her mama stood. “We need to tell her.”

“Lydia,” her papa warned.

“It’s time, William.” Lydia walked to the closet in the hall, opened it, and pulled a metal box off the top shelf way in the back.

“Don’t Lydia,” her papa said, fatigue etching heavy lines into his face.

Devra stared at him, then focused on the box in her mother’s hands. A strange trepidation kicked up her heartbeat. Her future was in that box, along with all the secrets from her past. It was the key to unlocking the nightmare that had been her life and, all this time, it’d been right there in the hall closet of her childhood home.

“I have to, William. I should have years ago. We both should have.” With a thud, her mama dropped the box on the yellow Formica table, then fished in the drawer next to the refrigerator for the small key. Her hands shook as she opened the lock and lifted the lid. Inside was a manila envelope that had discolored with time.

Suddenly, Devra was finding it difficult to breathe. Her mama sat in the chair next to her. “Your papa and I promised the Lord to love you and protect you each and every day of our lives, and we’ve tried to do that. That is why we chose not to tell you about what is in this envelope. It’s only because we feel—”

William grunted.

“—I feel it would serve you better to know the truth about your past that I’m telling you now. Because behind it all, Devra, it doesn’t matter where you came from or who your parents were. We are your family and you are loved.” Tears misted her eyes.

---