ALSO BY KAY BRATT

Wish Me Home

Dancing with the Sun

Silent Tears: A Journey of Hope in a Chinese Orphanage

Chasing China: A Daughter’s Quest for Truth

Mei Li and the Wise Laoshi

Eyes Like Mine

The Bridge

A Thread Unbroken

Train to Nowhere

The Palest Ink

The Scavenger’s Daughters

Tangled Vines

Bitter Winds

Red Skies

TITLE PAGE

COPYRIGHT PAGE

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Text copyright © 2019 by Kay Bratt

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

Published by Lake Union Publishing, Seattle

Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Lake Union Publishing are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

ISBN-13: 9781542008075

ISBN-10: 1542008077

Cover design by Shasti O’Leary Soudant

DEDICATION

To Amanda

My Gypsy Girl

Contents

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

From the Author: The Story Behind the Story

READERS DISCUSSION GUIDE

About the Author

Chapter One

Chapter One

Quinn held the small box in her hands, so focused on the contents that even the busy Savannah traffic outside the condo couldn’t penetrate her thoughts. The box felt weightless. Other than the tiny molecules painted on the side, it was plain and unassuming.

But it could be the link to her future.

Or her past.

At this point in her life, both were uncertain.

The only thing she knew for sure was that she needed to begin living again. Before she could do that, she needed to put her mother to rest. In her latest self-help book, she’d read that grief never ends, but it changes. That it’s a passage, and not a place to stay. Quinn needed to pull herself out of the pit of sorrow she’d been living in before she drowned in it.

An hour earlier, she’d watched the final episode in the latest season of Long-Lost Family, a series that highlighted family reunions between people who’d never met, and she couldn’t help but think of what results the small box could bring to her own life.