Chapter 1 - THE PHOTOGRAPH IN THE FIRE
Celeste tore the framed photograph out of Lucas’s hands so hard that the six-year-old stumbled forward.
“Give it back!”
She didn’t.
She crossed the family room of Damian’s Glen Ellyn, Illinois home, opened the fireplace screen, and threw the picture directly into the flames.
Lucas screamed.
“Mom!”
He dropped toward the hearth.
Celeste blocked him.
“She’s gone,” she said coldly. “I’m your mother now.”
Lucas looked up through tears.
“You’re NOT my mother!”
Damian heard him from the kitchen.
He ran in.
The photograph was already curling black at one corner.
Damian grabbed the fireplace tongs, pulled it from the flames, and dropped it safely onto the stone hearth.
The glass had cracked.
The photograph showed Lucas at four years old sitting on his mother Natalie’s lap at Brookfield Zoo.
Natalie had been unreachable for almost eleven months.
Not legally dead.
Not confirmed dead.
Just gone.
Damian stepped between Celeste and his son.
“Touch his mother’s things again and you’re out.”
Lucas immediately grabbed the back of his shirt.
Celeste’s face tightened.
“She’s DEAD, Damian. Stop teaching him she’s coming back.”
Lucas stopped crying.
That silence frightened Damian.
His son looked at Celeste.
Then at him.
Slowly, Lucas reached for Damian’s hand.
“Then why does Mom call Celeste every Sunday?”
The fire cracked behind them.
Damian felt his fingers go numb.
Celeste’s face emptied.
“What did you say?”
Lucas swallowed.
“I hear her phone.”
Celeste took a step backward.
Damian stared at the woman he had planned to marry in June.
“Lucas.”
His voice came out rough.
“How do you know it’s Mom?”
“Because Celeste says her name.”
Celeste moved toward the hallway.
Damian stepped in front of her.
“Where’s your phone?”
“Damian—”
“Where is it?”
“You’re scaring Lucas.”
Damian looked down.
She was right about one thing.
Lucas did not need another adult exploding in front of him.
Damian crouched.
“Buddy, go get your stuffed bear and wait in the kitchen for me.”
Lucas hesitated.
“Is Mom alive?”
Damian’s throat closed.
“I don’t know yet.”
Lucas nodded.
Damian had spent months giving him gentler answers.
Maybe someday.
We have to remember Mommy loved you.
Nobody knows where she is.
Tonight he stopped pretending uncertainty was comforting.
When Lucas left, Damian stood again.
Celeste’s confidence was gone.
“Every Sunday?” he asked.
She crossed her arms.
“You’re believing a six-year-old over me?”
“No.”
Damian looked at the burned photograph.
“I’m asking why a six-year-old would invent something you’re terrified to answer.”
Celeste’s eyes flicked toward her purse.
May you like
Damian saw it.
And suddenly the phone inside that purse became more important than every explanation she had given him for the last eleven months.
