Finding Colin Firth: A Novel Read Free Page A

phone number,” the woman continued. “The Best Little Diner in Boothbay.”
    Veronica Russo. Her birth mother had a name. She was a real person, living and breathing, and she’d updated the file. She’d left every possible piece of contact information.
    Her birth mother wanted to be found.
    Bea thanked the woman and hung up. She shivered and grabbed her favorite sweater, her father’s old off-white fisherman sweater that her mother had bought him while they were on their honeymoon in Ireland. It was the same sweater her father wore in her favorite picture, with Bea up on his shoulders. She put it on and hugged herself, wishing it smelled like her dad, like Ivory soap and Old Spice and safety, but her dad had been gone since Bea was nine. A long time. For the next eleven years, it was just Bea and her mom, both sets of grandparents long gone, both Cranes only children.
    And then Bea lost her mother. She was alone.
    She walked to the window seat and stared out at the rain sluicing down. I have a birth mother. Her name is Veronica Russo. She lives in a place called Boothbay Harbor, Maine.
    She works in a diner called the Best Little Diner in Boothbay.
    Which had a cute ring. A woman who worked in a diner like that couldn’t be so bad, right? She was probably a waitress,one of those friendly types who called her customers “hon.” Or maybe she’d fallen on hard times and was hard-bitten, a shell of a woman who set down eggs over easy and fish and chips with a depressive thud.
    Maybe she was a short-order cook. That might explain Bea’s ability to make an incredible hamburger, not that she could cook anything in her kitchenless room. This past year, between her jobs at Crazy Burger and the Writing Center, she had enough money to pay her rent. But now she would come up short for July, and the Writing Center was open only part-time for the summer sessions. Her last lousy paycheck, a half week’s pay from Crazy Burger, wouldn’t help much either.
    She had nowhere to be, nowhere to go. But she had this name, and an address.
    Bea could take a drive up to Maine, make herself walk into the Best Little Diner, sit at the counter and order a cup of coffee, and look at the name tags on the waitresses’ aprons. She would be able to check out her birth mother from a very close distance. She could do that.
    Yes. She would drive up, check out Veronica Russo, and if it seemed right to Bea, she would introduce herself. Not that she had any idea how to go about that. Maybe she’d leave a note in her mailbox, or just call. Then they’d meet somewhere, for a walk or coffee. Bea would find out what she needed to know so she could stop wondering, speculating, driving herself crazy. Then she’d say thank you to Veronica Russo for the information and drive back home to Boston and start looking for a new place to live. And a new job. Maybe she had to let go of her dream of being a teacher. She’d come home once her past had beensettled, and she’d figure out what the hell she was supposed to be doing with her life.
    Home. As if there were one. This room was nothing more than a big closet. And her mother’s rental cottage on Cape Cod, where she and her mom had moved after her father died, had long ago been sold by the owner. But that little white cottage had been the one place left on earth that had felt like home at Thanksgiving, Christmas, summer breaks, and at times when Bea was stressed or heartbroken or just needed her mama.
    Now there were just memories and this old fisherman sweater. And a stranger named Veronica Russo, up in Maine. Waiting a long time to be found by Bea.

Chapter 2

VERONICA RUSSO
    Only an idiot would attempt to make a pie—a special-ordered chocolate caramel cream Amore Pie—while watching Pride and Prejudice. Had she put in the vanilla? What about the salt? Damn Colin Firth and his pond-soaked white shirt. Veronica set down her measuring spoons on the flour-dusted counter and gave her full attention to the