The Memory Keeper: A Heartwarming, Feel-Good Romance(46)

“Not really,” Hannah replied, picking at her cookie. She started filling her mother in about work and what Liam had admitted to her over coffee.

“Life can get absolutely manic sometimes,” her mother said, shaking her head. “Hopefully, one day you’ll be able to look back on this period in your life and understand what it was all for.”

“Maybe…” she said, when her phone went off in her pocket. She hardly dared check it for fear it was Amanda, but regardless, she probably should answer. Hannah put down the cookie and took out her phone. “Hang on a sec,” she said, confused. “It’s Georgia, the girl I rode home with.” She answered the call to Georgia’s sobs.

“I need your help. Can you come get me?” she cried. “I didn’t want to call, but I don’t have anywhere to go,” Georgia said, her breath heaving.

“Oh my gosh. Yes. Where are you?”

“I’m at the corner of Fourth and Church.” She sniffled.

“I’m not far. Stay right there. I’ll come pick you up.”

“What’s wrong?” her mother asked when Hannah hung up the phone.

“Georgia is all upset. She asked if I’d come get her in town.” She stood up and went over to the coat closet, pulling out her coat and threading her arm into the sleeve. “May I have the keys to Dad’s truck?” she asked.

“Of course,” her mother said, digging the keys out of her purse and handing them to Hannah.

“Thanks. I’ll be right back.”

Hannah jumped in her dad’s truck, which stayed at Gran’s for when they visited from Florida and needed to run errands for her, and drove to get Georgia, the engine protesting from not being warmed up properly in the winter weather.

When she got there, Georgia and Jerry were on the corner in the freezing cold. Georgia climbed into the passenger seat, lumping her bags in with her and setting Jerry in her lap. “I’m so sorry to bother you,” she said with red eyes as she fumbled to latch her seatbelt, her hands shaking, “but I’ve tried everything, and I didn’t know where else to go. I’ve been sleeping in the woods since Liam dropped me off, and it’s too cold to keep doing that.”

“Oh my gosh, what happened?” Hannah asked.

“I had a lead for finding my parents from the agency where I was adopted. They gave me two photos: one of my parents and the other a baby photo that I’m assuming is a sibling. The back says, ‘Franklin, Tennessee.’” She turned the photo over to reveal the name of their location in scratchy pencil. “So I thought this was the town where they lived. My father dropped the photos off to them one day about thirty years ago, and told them to give them to me if I ever came looking, despite the contact veto he’d signed. He confided in the agency that he was having second thoughts about signing.”

“What’s a contact veto?”

“It’s a document that prohibits the release of information about my parents unless I agree not to contact them. I came to Franklin to do some research and see if I could find out who they are. I was just going to introduce myself, and if they didn’t want anything to do with me, I’d leave. I came thinking I’d find them right away in such a small town. I hired an investigator here who was going to help me, but when I met with him, he said he needed more than unnamed photos with no other identification. He’s going to guess the age of the child and see if he can find birth records, but it’s a long shot. I’ve shown them to everyone, and I have no leads. I really thought I’d find them, but I guess I was wrong.”

“Why didn’t you call me sooner?” Hannah asked.

“I didn’t want to bother you with everything else you’ve got going on, but when the investigator told me he had no leads, I just crumbled. I spent my last bit of savings on the trip here, and I have no job, no money—nothing. I wanted to find my family, and now I just feel lost.”

“Stay with me at my gran’s. There’s plenty of room,” Hannah offered, rounding the corner, and making her way toward Gran’s house.

“You sure it’s okay?” Georgia asked.

“Of course it’s okay,” Hannah replied. She actually liked the idea of having Georgia around. Perhaps she could help her new friend in some way.



“I think he likes that, Dad,” Hannah said, while Chuck rolled the old tennis ball he’d found in the shed across the floor.

He let out a loud guffaw when Jerry sprinted after it, his little paws tip-tapping while he growled and tried to bite it, his tail wagging a mile a minute.

“Watch this,” her father said with another chuckle. He walked over, took the ball off the floor, and sat down with it.

Jerry ran over and planted himself in front of him, staring up at the ball, his tail wagging back and forth over the carpet. Chuck rolled the ball gently across the floor and Jerry tore off after it, barking and sending Chuck into fits of laughter.

“I needed this,” her dad said.

“We’ll have to get him some toys,” Maura suggested with her hands on her hips, the dish towel she’d been using to clean up dangling from her fist. “He’s too cute.” She shook her head fondly at the dog. “Georgia, come on to the table. You need some good ol’ southern cookin’ after the night you’ve had.”