Chapter 20: Mama

Finbar's POV

The harbor was gray at six in the morning, and the fishing fleet had already gone out.

Only the east dock was occupied.

Dalton stood at the rail with Poppy on his hip, in a yellow raincoat too big for her.

Ingrid stood a little behind me with her thumbs in her pockets. She had come without being asked.

Brooke's white sedan was parked at the top of the ramp. Her bag was in the back seat.

She walked down the planks alone, in jeans and a gray sweater, with her hair tied back and no makeup.

The brace was gone from her wrist.

I looked at it. She saw me look.

"It was only a sprain," she said. "I wore it for a week longer than I needed."

Nobody answered her. There was nothing to say to that.

She stopped in front of Dalton and held out a manila envelope.

"I signed it last night at the motel desk," she said. "Your lawyer sent it. Everything. Poppy lives with you."

Dalton took it with one hand. He did not open it.

"I didn't ask you for this," he said.

"I know. I'm giving it."

"Brooke."

"Don't be kind to me, Dalton. I can't do anything with it."

She turned to Poppy.

The child stared at her with her whale clamped under her chin.

"Hi, baby," Brooke said.

"Mama."

Brooke's face did what I had seen it do once before, on the dock, for a moment.

It went blank and raw and young.

She knelt on the planks, and Poppy leaned out of Dalton's arms and put a flat hand on her cheek.

"Mama's going away," Brooke said. "For a long time. It isn't because of you."

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