Chapter 17: The Lobby

Joanna's POV

Patricia's car stopped at the curb, and I was out of it before the driver reached the door.

There were thirty people on the plaza.

I knew some of them by sight from six years of holiday parties.

There were the receptionists, a man from accounts, and two women from legal with their badges still on.

Every one of them was watching my husband.

Landon stood at the top of the steps with his tie pulled loose, and he was pointing.

At the bottom of the plaza, at the corner, Caleb was walking up the pavement at the pace of a child.

Max walked beside him with one hand wrapped in the blue wool of Caleb's sleeve.

He saw me at the same time I saw him.

"Mama," Max said.

It was not loud.

It went through the whole plaza anyway.

I crossed the stone and stopped a yard away from him.

I got down on my knees on the cold ground in my navy dress.

"Hi, bug."

"The tide was wrong," he told me. "The Marguerite was late."

"I heard."

"I saw the boat."

"I'm so glad."

I did not touch him.

I let him look at me for as long as he needed.

His hand came off the sleeve, found my jacket and held it hard.

Then I stood, and he stayed pressed against my hip, and I turned to my husband.

"Landon," I said.

"That man," Landon said, loud, "took my son off a public street. I want him arrested."

It was one of the guards, the older one with the gray mustache, and he sounded uncomfortable.

"Mr. Reed, the little boy walked out the side door by himself," he said. "I saw it on the monitor."

"You what?"

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