Michael forced himself to breathe slowly. “Are you hungry?” he asked. “There’s a diner across the street. Pancakes. Hot chocolate. No strings attached.”
Grace hesitated. She had learned that kindness usually came with conditions. But Rebecca’s tears weren’t fake. And Michael looked less like a threat and more like a man barely standing.
“What do you want from me?” Grace asked bluntly.
Rebecca swallowed. “That necklace belonged to our daughter,” she said honestly. “Seeing it on you… it feels impossible. We just want to understand. We won’t take it. I promise.”
Grace tightened her grip on the pendant. It was the only thing that had never been taken from her.
Her gaze drifted to the headstone behind them.
She read the name slowly: “Abigail Anderson. Our light. Forever loved.”
Silence thickened.
Michael felt something in his chest tear open. The dates on the stone—Abigail would have been exactly Grace’s age.
“Grace,” he said carefully, “can we see Miss Linda together?”
Suspicion flickered in her eyes. “Why?”
“Because if there’s even the smallest chance…” Rebecca’s voice broke. “We need to know.”
After a long pause, Grace nodded once.
The shelter was only three blocks away. Grace walked slightly ahead, as if leading them into her world. The building smelled of bleach and overcooked vegetables. The front desk clerk looked startled when Michael and Rebecca stepped inside—tailored coats, polished shoes, faces pale with urgency.
“Miss Linda?” Grace called.
A woman in her forties emerged from an office. She froze when she saw the couple.
“Can I help you?”
Michael spoke first. “We believe Grace may be our daughter.”
The words felt impossible and fragile in the air.
Miss Linda’s expression shifted from confusion to caution. “That’s a serious claim.”
Rebecca removed a photo from her purse—a picture she carried every day. A newborn baby wrapped in a pink blanket. Around her neck: the same medallion.
Miss Linda inhaled sharply.
“She was found the night of the hospital fire,” she said slowly. “No identification. Authorities assumed her family didn’t survive. We tried for months to trace records, but the system was chaos back then.”
Michael’s knees nearly buckled.
“There was no body,” Rebecca whispered. “They told us she died in the smoke.”
Grace stood silent, eyes wide. “You think I’m… yours?”
Rebecca knelt carefully, keeping distance. “We don’t know yet. But we hope. More than anything.”