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Chapters (51)
  1. The Family Secret
  2. Copyright
  3. Praise for Tracy Buchanan’s novels
  4. What readers loved about Tracy Buchanan’s last novel, The Lost Sister …
  5. Dedication
  6. Table of Contents
  7. Prologue
  8. Chapter One
  9. Chapter Two
  10. Chapter Three
  11. Chapter Four
  12. Chapter Five
  13. Chapter Six
  14. Chapter Seven
  15. Chapter Eight
  16. Chapter Nine
  17. Chapter Ten
  18. Chapter Eleven
  19. Chapter Twelve
  20. Chapter Thirteen
  21. Chapter Fourteen
  22. Chapter Fifteen
  23. Chapter Sixteen
  24. Chapter Seventeen
  25. Chapter Eighteen
  26. Chapter Nineteen
  27. Chapter Twenty
  28. Chapter Twenty-One
  29. Chapter Twenty-Two
  30. Chapter Twenty-Three
  31. Chapter Twenty-Four
  32. Chapter Twenty-Five
  33. Chapter Twenty-Six
  34. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  35. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  36. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  37. Chapter Thirty
  38. Chapter Thirty-One
  39. Chapter Thirty-Two
  40. Chapter Thirty-Three
  41. Chapter Thirty-Four
  42. Letter to my readers
  43. Acknowledgments
  44. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  45. With the loss of her mother, Becky aches to find her sister. She knows she cannot move forward in her life without answers…
  46. A girl has gone missing. You’ve never met her, but you’re to blame…
  47. You’d kill to protect your child…Wouldn’t you?
  48. Everything you’ve built your life on is a lie. And no one has been telling the truth for a very long time…
  49. How far would you go for the one you love the most?
  50. Also by Tracy Buchanan
  51. About the Publisher

She’d called me the next weekend, told me she was going to book tickets to the UK for December and I couldn’t stop her. I’d told her I wouldn’t go, simple as that. I still half-expected some tickets to arrive in the post the next week, but they didn’t, and soon Lumin was so wrapped up in her new life at university, she didn’t mention it again. She’d even made plans to stay an extra few days at university before Christmas.

But I couldn’t forget it, her words ringing in my ears. With Lumin at university, the quiet of the barn had made my thoughts turn back to my childhood. I’d been so used to either being on shoots around the world or being with Lumin that I hadn’t stopped to properly think of my past before she was born. In the two months since Lumin had been at university, I thought so many times of booking flights back to the UK. Just going back to Winterton Chine, seeking out my parents, begging forgiveness for disappearing off the face of the earth. But it had also been about seeing if I could forgive them too. Being a mother now made me realise how difficult it is to turn your back on your child, no matter what they have done. How could they have just abandoned me like that?

But so many times, I chickened out.

Until a week ago. I knew Lumin would be home on Christmas Eve. So I decided to book a flight to the UK a few days before. I needed to do this myself.

And now here I was, back in my childhood town.

I took a deep breath, catching sight of the beach in the distance. It hadn’t changed much, still so beautiful in the winter, ice a mosaic against the sand. The cold waves swelled then flowed away, the winter sun glinting from above. Four women sit in front of the row of beach huts, laughing about something.

So many times I’d walked along this beach, escaped to it too after what had happened.

Tears welled in my eyes. How different things would have been if I’d been able to stay. But then I wouldn’t have my Lumin. I wouldn’t have met Dylan.

‘See, Dylan. I’m here,’ I whispered to the wind. ‘I’m facing my truth, like you did.’

Chapter Thirty-Two

Amber

Winterton Chine

24 December 2009

Amber and Lumin walk towards the gift shop where Amber’s mum and aunt are ‘womaning the fort’ as Viv had put it. Lumin has just been to hospital for a check-up and her doctor was confident that, with time, she would regain her memory.