Chapter 123

Aria’s POV

When Liam and William returned from the doctor, William went straight to his room. I stood, hoping to stop them both, but William just skirted around me and dashed away.

Liam ran a hand down his face, looking stressed. “He wouldn’t say a word to me the entire time. He barely said anything to the doctor. The doctor couldn’t even figure out what was wrong with him.”

“I think I know,” I said.

“You do?” Liam asked, hope and curiosity pushing back some of the defeat in his eyes.

I removed the envelope from my pocket and passed it Liam. “While you were gone, I cleaned up some in William’s room. I found this in his backpack.”

Liam frowned at the envelope. Pulling out the letter, his eyes darted across the words. “Shit,” he cursed. “William had this?” Then he cursed again, louder. “I made him get the mail yesterday. I thought he was acting weird. This is all my fault.”

“It isn’t,” I insisted. If anyone was to blame, it was me, for not believing Liam when he told me William wasn’t his biological son. For letting Sophia get into my head all the time.

Now, because of my insecurities, a little boy was left feeling like he’d lost all of his family.

There was no use in casting blame over how this happened. What mattered now was the actions we took to move forward and resolve this. William was hurt. We had to find a way to fix that before we could even entertain any other thoughts.

“You should talk to him,” I said. “He needs his father right now, more than ever.”

“He needs his mother, too,” Liam replied.

With a sigh, I said, “The last time I took him to see Sophia, she was so terrible to William. I wouldn’t want to do that to him again.”

“I wasn’t talking about Sophia, Aria. I said he needs his mother. That means you.”

It took a moment for his words to fully sink in. Yes, William had begun calling me Mom, and I’d tried my best to live up to the role. Yet still there seemed to be a kind of wedge between us, a fear perhaps that one or the other of us would change our minds.

I would never change my mind about William. He was my son, now and forever. Maybe what he really needed from me right now was to prove it to him.

I could only imagine how he must have been feeling. Sophia had said such terrible things to him when we’d gone to visit her. Then, only a few weeks later, he turned around and discovered Liam wasn’t related to him by blood.

“Okay,” I said. “Let’s talk to him.” However, I could help, I would – even if the only thing I could really do was be there for him.

Liam held out his hand. After I took it, we went together down the hallway towards William’s room.

Liam knocked. “William? It’s your Mom and Dad. Can we come in? We really want to talk.”

We waited a moment, listening. But after a moment, we still didn’t hear anything. Not a creak on the bed. Not a patter of footsteps. Nothing.

“William? You okay in there?” Liam called, some worry rising in his voice.

Releasing my hand, he grabbed the handle of the door and pushed it open.

William was not in his room. Neither was his backpack.

A folded up piece of paper on his desk caught my eye. I walked toward it and lifted it.

Immediately my heart dropped down to the floor.

“Liam, come look at this,” I said.

Liam walked toward me, reading the note over my shoulder.

It read,

Dear Liam and Aria,

I know you aren’t my real parents. Sorry for being mean to Joe. I’ll go now, so you can be a real family.

William.

The blood drained from my face so quickly that I felt light-headed. Fading, I fell backwards into Liam who remained like a rock behind me.

Without word, Liam led me over to William’s bed and helped me sit down.

“I’m going out to find him,” Liam said. “He couldn’t have gotten too far.”

“I’ll look too,” I said.

“When you catch your breath,” Liam said. “Call Isabella. We don’t want to worry Joe.”

I agreed wholeheartedly with that.

“Find him, Liam,” I said. “Find our son.”

Leaning down, Liam kissed me lightly on the forehead. Then, he turned and was gone out the door.

I stayed where I was for a long moment, trying to calm down. I couldn’t lose my head right now, not when William was out there alone, needing us.

After one last calming breath, I stood and walked into the kitchen to find my purse and my phone. With a brief phone call to Isabella, she was on her way. The moment she arrived, I gave her only a quick hello before I was out the door in search of my son.

Through text, Liam told me the places he searched: the nearby streets and the park.

I headed the opposite direction toward the school, checking all the side streets, alleyways and candy shops I could find along the way.

William was not anywhere to be found.

As I stood in front of the school, I called every friend of William and Joe’s that I could think of. Their parents were sympathetic and promised to keep an eye and ear out, but none of them had heard from William.

Eventually, Liam joined me at the school, his own search as futile as mine.

“He has to be somewhere,” Liam said, pacing. “He’s only six. Where could he have gone?”

I wouldn’t give voice to my deepest fears, that someone had seen a small, innocent boy wandering alone and had taken him.

“You’ve asked Isabella? He hasn’t come home?” Liam asked.

I’d been checking with Isabella every ten minutes. “Nothing so far.”

Liam shoved his hands through his hair. I’d never seen him this stressed out before. He had good reason to be, but it was scaring me even more than I was already.

We both needed to calm down and think clearly.

William had said in the note that he was going to leave so that the rest of us could be a real family. If he was abandoning us, where would he have gone?

Back to his old family.

He wouldn’t know how to get to the jail to see Sophia. It was too far away.

But his old house? In his old neighborhood?

“Liam,” I said. “I think I have an idea.”

Five minutes later, Liam pulled his car to a screeching halt outside of Sophia’s old house. As it was still technically a crime scene, it had been locked up tight but not sold or otherwise touched at all.

In fact it looked almost exactly the same as it had the last time I’d been here, when Sophia had tried to kill me.

Except this time, William was sitting alone on the front stoop. Holding his backpack with both hands, he was huddled up on the ground like he was trying to make himself small. Maybe even invisible.

Liam threw the car in park and bolted out of it without even turning off the ignition.

I rushed to follow.

William peeked up from his bag. “Dad? I mean… Liam?”

Liam and I didn’t slow, not until we were at William’s side and he was held safely in both of our arms.