Cursed by Love by Jacie Floyd Page A

Sleeping Lotus?” Gabe perked
up like Penny with a new chew toy.
    “No, sorry. The most important part for Mom ,
I should have said. It’s the false trail I was on when you called last night.
They’re letters.” She pulled the stack of correspondence out of her bag and
offered it to her mother on the palms of her hands. “From your father.”
    “My father?” Mom’s eyes widened to
saucer-size. “When were they written?”
    “Right after you were born, when he
shipped out overseas.”
    Mom reached out quickly then drew her
hands back, before gingerly taking the letters, as if she feared they were too
delicate to handle. “I had no idea. Why didn’t Mother ever show them to me? Did
he mention me? Oh, Molly! Now, this is a real treasure, worth more to me than
all the money in the world. Thank you, darling.” She hugged them to her chest,
her fingers stroking the wrinkled onionskin. “Have you read them?”
    “I started to. They were beautiful, but
pretty personal. I thought I should let you have first crack at them. There may
be revelations you don’t want anyone else to know.”
    “There may be revelations he wouldn’t
have wanted his daughter to know,” Mother countered, wryly. “I’m sure the
censors would have redacted any military or government secrets out of them
before they reached Mother.”
    Molly glanced over at Gabe to see if he
had resumed his study of his shoes. Nope, his gaze seemed to have moved from
his feet to hers. But that couldn’t be right. Why would he stare at her feet?
Self-consciously, her toes curled inside her sandals, and she crossed her
ankles.
    After a moment, he turned and picked up
an antique abacus her dad had given her mom one Christmas. He flicked the beads
up and down in the columns as if tallying s complicated sum.
    “But you’re going to read them, right?”
Molly asked.
    “Oh, definitely.” Mother pulled an
envelope out of the packet, lifted the flap, and peered inside. After a
moment’s hesitation, she removed the delicate sheet of paper and unfolded it.
“My goodness, my heart’s fluttering like a schoolgirl, and my palms are damp. I
feel like I’m about to meet my father.” She closed her eyes and pressed her
lips together. “At last.”
    Molly’s eyes welled up, imagining how
she would feel if she had never known her father. She might be angry with him
now, but her life would be incomplete without him and all the things he’d
taught her. Without all the special moments they’d shared.
    “I should go.” Gabe turned to her
mother. “So you can take your time and have some privacy during the introduction.”
    “Good idea.” Molly jumped up. “I’ll go,
too. And knowing that Nonna had a couple of Bella
scrapbooks gives me some added incentive to finish going through those boxes.
I’ll take a couple more home with me tonight.”
    Gabe got to his feet. “I could lend a
hand.”
    Molly’s heart shimmied as she pictured
Gabe in her doll-sized house, taking up space next to her on the living room
floor, and breathing her air.
    “That would be great.” She swept her
eyelashes down to hide her fizzy reaction. “Call me later if you want to talk,
Mom.” She turned to give her mother a quick hug before hooking his arm with her
hand. “Come help me fetch and carry. We’ll grab some cartons from the basement,
then head out.”
    “Pleasure meeting you, Mrs. Webber,”
Gabe said.
    “The pleasure was mine.” She fingered
the edges of her father’s letters. “Come back any time. Bring the Sleeping
Lotus.”
    “Will do.” He winked as he trailed Molly
from the room.
    “Should I follow you again?” he asked,
after they’d lugged Molly’s choice of boxes from the house and deposited them
in her car trunk. He peered at her from the shadows cast by the corner
streetlight. “I’m starting to feel like a stalker.”
    “I’ll give you the address and
directions to my house. It’s not far.” A hint of his cologne drifted to her.
She inhaled,