Betrayed: She Took My Son novel · Chapter 22 of 24

Chapter 22: This Side of the Glass

The visiting room at the county jail had eight stools and eight windows of scratched glass.

I knew how to sit in a room like that. I had learned it.

A guard checked my name against a clipboard and pointed me to the fourth stool.

The glass was smeared with other people's hands. I lifted the phone on the wall and held the receiver against my ear.

On the other side, a door buzzed.

Lacey came in wearing a tan jumpsuit with her hair pulled back.

Without the baggy sweaters she looked small and young.

Her face was gray.

She sat down across from me.

For a moment neither of us picked up.

Then she did.

"You came," she said.

"You asked."

"I didn't think you would."

"Neither did I."

She looked at my hands, then at the wall behind me, where the guard stood with his arms crossed.

I put my palm flat on the glass.

I wanted to know what it felt like from this side.

It was cold, and it didn't give.

"Is he all right?" Lacey asked.

"He's well. He's cutting a tooth."

"Which one?"

"The bottom front."

She smiled, and then her mouth shook, and she put her hand over it.

"I'm sorry to be a mess."

"That's not what you're here to be sorry for."

She dropped her hand.

"No."

"What do you want, Lacey?"

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