Close Proximity. Donna Clayton

his lips together, he shook his head. He wished…oh, how he wished. He’d have settled for whispery images. Blurry pictures of a dark-haired, dark-eyed man. Pride shining in his gaze. Laughter. Love.

      But Rafe had none of these things. He had no memory of his father. None whatsoever.

      “That’s sad,” Libby said. “So sad.”

      Sidestepping the dark pit of depressing emotion, Rafe carried on with his story.

      “Onna moved us into town,” he told Libby.

      “Onna…” She paused, then queried him with a look. “Onna means mother?”

      He nodded. “She took a job as a housekeeper.” Tension gathered in every muscle of his body. He was getting too close to the badness. Too close to the foul memories. But he’d dived into the pool of the past. The challenge now would be to swim across without drowning.

      “She ended up marrying the man.” Pain ached in his jaw. “Curtis James adopted me. My onna had two children while she was with him. My half brother, River, and my half sister, Cheyenne.”

      Glancing down, Rafe saw that his grip on the knife left his knuckles white. He tried to relax. But it was nearly impossible.