Page 98 of When You Became Mine

I blinked. And blinked again. “I started sponsoring John Mark a few months ago. Like, I don’t know, six maybe? I can’t remember when exactly. Why?”

Lawson screwed his eyes shut and blew out a harsh breath. “Let me think for a minute.”

He read over the now wrinkled paper again as he stalked back and forth in front of where I stood.

“What’s wrong?” I asked again but decided not to say anything more as he shot me a look that could have made plants wither on the stalk.

The more he paced, the higher my anxiety grew until I couldn’t take it anymore. “Jesus, Lawson, tell me what the hell is going on!” My voice was shrill and Lawson stopped in his tracks.

“Do you have any more letters from them?”

I nodded. I’d kept them all, most of them containing pictures of John Mark.

He turned on his heel and stalked to my bedroom, barking over his shoulder, “Get them for me.”

I rushed after him and went straight to my nightstand to pull them out. I’d barely turned around to hand them over before he grabbed them and started shuffling through the letters, his eyes quickly scanning the contents of each.

When he was done, his eyes landed on my face, but he was looking through me. “I have to call Pieters.”

As he nearly ran down the hall to his office, it was all I could do to follow behind him, hoping I would glean some information from the phone call. His cell was already to his ear when I caught up with him.

“Pieters,” he clipped, “get your ass to my house now.”

Pause.

“Don’t give a shit what you’re doing.”

Pause.

“Don’t care how hot she is.” Pause to check his watch. “It’s barely five o’clock, you should be —fuck, I don’t care what you should be doing. I expect you on my front porch in ten.”

Pause.

“Fine, fifteen.”

He hung up and turned to where I was standing in the doorway, watching him intently.

“Are you going to tell me what’s going on?”

He gave a curt nod and waved the paper in my direction. “I just found our missing link.”

I couldn’t hide my confusion as I asked, “John Mark is the missing link? To what, exactly?”

He began to pace again, something I don’t think I’d ever seen him do before, and the confusion mixed with frustration that he was talking in riddles.

“Dammit, you’re freaking me the hell out! Please give me a straight answer. What is going on here?”

That godforsaken piece of paper, which now looked like it had been dug out of the bottom of a garbage can, was waved in my direction once more. “This kid doesn’t exist.”

I froze. “What? John Mark? Of course he does. I’ve been sending him school supplies and presents and paying for his health care and food for months now. Every few weeks, I get an update on him. It was his birthday last month. I got a handwritten thank you note, for God’s sake.”

Lawson’s eyes shut as he shook his head. A clip of laughter that held no humor passed through his upturned lips.

“What’s so funny?”

I watched as his chest visibly expanded, the breath he pulled in through his nose so large. But it was the words he said next that caused my heart to skip a beat. “You’ve been conned, Piper.”

40

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