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A few pictures included Vern, a solidly built man who was considerably shorter than Daniel had ended up. Daniel couldn’t see a trace of himself in Vernon Kane’s round face, not even in the shape of their eyes or noses, the line of their brows. Maybe he should have wondered sooner. Presumably, Vern had studied him and come to the same conclusion.
    Most of those early pictures were of marginal quality. People in them were squinting at the sun, or were slightlyout of focus. Hazy memories made scenes clearer in his mind, but this album wasn’t exactly an award-winning photographic record of his childhood.
    And then he turned the page and found himself looking at his kindergarten picture, professionally taken and as bright as the day he’d carried the packet home in his book bag. His face was freckled, and his hair had already darkened from the bright copper tufts he was born with to something closer to his current color. He was smiling, but…warily. Not with the open gaze Daniel expected to see.
    He stared at the picture, but it wasn’t his face he saw. Superimposed was another boy’s, one who had gazed speculatively at him while asking Rebecca when she was coming back into the restaurant.
    A boy who looked so much like Daniel at this age, they could have been mirror images except for the eyes. Unlike Daniel’s, the boy’s were brown, a warm chocolate brown.
    Just like his mother’s.
    The kid had come out boldly because he didn’t understand why his mother had gone off to talk to that strange man.
    “Son of a bitch,” Daniel murmured.
    The puzzle pieces slotted into place so damn effortlessly, he couldn’t understand how he’d failed to fit them together sooner.
    She’d been pregnant when she left him, and she’d never told him. No wonder she was shocked to see him! No wonder she’d hustled him out of the restaurant before he could get a good look at the boy—at his son. No wonder she’d been dying to get rid of him.
    I have a son.
    A son who, thanks to Rebecca Ballard, must think his father didn’t give a damn.
     

    “M OM, THE PHONE ’ S RINGING !” Malcolm bellowed from his bedroom.
    Rebecca laughed and rolled her eyes as she reached for the handset. “I hear it,” she yelled back, then hit Talk. “Hello?”
    Daniel’s voice was deep and distinctive. “Was I going to be invited to his high-school graduation?”
    The kitchen floor seemed to drop and roll beneath her feet, a sensation terrifyingly familiar to a lifetime resident of a city famous for earthquakes. She had that disoriented, queasy feeling that lodged her stomach and heart somewhere they didn’t belong and made her want to run. She backed against the refrigerator, needing its solid bulk to anchor her.
    “Daniel,” she whispered.
    “A father, it seems.”
    “I thought…you hadn’t realized.”
    His voice was taut. “The sight of him…niggled. I finally got to thinking enough to take out the photo album my mother kept.”
    She squeezed her eyes shut. The pent-up need to flee pressed harder and harder at her chest wall. Unwillingly, she said, “He looks just like you did.”
    “Except for his eyes.”
    “Yes.”
    Rage roughened the timbre of his voice. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
    “You didn’t want to be a father.” She knew she sounded desperate. She was pressing so hard against the refrigerator, the pointed corners of the magnets hurt. “We didn’t have any future.”
    “What does that have to do with it?” He spaced the words coldly. “Not all parents live together.”
    “That’s not what I wanted for him.”
    “He’s my son, too.”
    Her face contorted. It was at least a minute before she could whisper, “Yes.”
    “I’m coming over tomorrow night.”
    At that her eyes popped open. “You know where I live?”
    “People aren’t hard to find.”
    “Malcolm…”
    This pause had a different quality. “Is that his name?”
    Malcolm Daniel . She could not tell him right now that she had acknowledged