Betrayed: She Took My Son novel · Chapter 10 of 24

Chapter 10: The Cul-de-Sac

On Saturday morning the cul-de-sac looked exactly the way I'd left it.

Folding tables stood on every lawn. There were boxes of paperbacks, a rack of kids' coats, and a lemonade stand run by a boy with a cash box.

Clayton parked his truck at the curb.

Dot sat in the back seat with her arms folded. She had refused to stay at the farm.

"Last chance," Clayton said quietly. "We can still drive away."

"No," I said.

I got out.

I wore Dot's navy dress and a cardigan of mine she had kept in a drawer for seven months.

The first neighbor to see me dropped a stack of plates.

The sound carried across the street, and heads began turning one table at a time.

I walked up the middle of the road.

Nobody spoke. A man selling a lawn mower took off his cap.

The woman with the minivan was standing by the mailbox. She had been at my shower, and she had put my cake in my kitchen.

"Mel," she said, and her eyes were wet. "Oh, honey. Where have you been?"

"Larkmont. In a locked ward. For seven months."

"They told us you'd gone away to recover."

"I was in restraints."

She pressed her hand over her mouth.

I kept walking.

The house had new curtains in the front window. There were two plastic toys on the porch, a yellow rattle and a blue block.

I climbed the steps and rang my own doorbell.

For a long moment nothing happened.

Then the door opened, and Lacey stood in the gap.

She wore a pink sweatshirt. She had a burp cloth over her shoulder.

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