The Line Between Here and Gone

The Line Between Here and Gone
Andrea Kane

The man she loved is gone forever. The child she lives for could be next. Each day is a struggle for Amanda Gleason’s newborn son as he battles a rare immune deficiency. Justin’s best chance for a cure lies with his father, who was brutally murdered before Amanda even realised she carried his child. Or was he?One e-mailed photo changes everything, planting a seed of doubt that Amanda latches on to for dear life: a recent photo of a man who looks exactly like Paul. Could Justin’s father be alive? Or worse, could Amanda be about to uncover a shocking truth that transcends her own family’s darkest secrets? A truth that could change lives forever…

AUTHOR NOTE

The Shinnecock Indian Reservation is located on the east side of Shinnecock Bay in the town of Southampton. While the Shinneock Indian Nation’s gaming authority is planning for a long-awaited casino, that casino does not yet exist. When it does, it will not be built on their reservation, which is their ancestral home, but elsewhere on Long Island. Therefore, the casino in The Line Between Here and Gone is a fictitious place, the product of this writer’s fertile imagination.

The Line

Between

Here

and

Gone

Andrea Kane

www.mirabooks.co.uk (http://www.mirabooks.co.uk)

To Myrna and Bob,

who helped me bring the Hamptons to life,

who acted as consultants extraordinaire for the year it took me

to create this novel, and whose love

and support mean the world to me.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

A host of people contributed to my writing this book, and I want to express my appreciation to each and every one of them for their time, their expertise, and their tolerance of a novelist who’s a relentless perfectionist.

My thanks go out to:

Angela Bell, Public Affairs Specialist, FBI Office of Public Affairs—and the real-life equivalent of a fairy godmother!

Former SSA John Mandrafina, FBI Undercover Coordinator/Sensitive Operations Program

SSA James McNamara, FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit 2

Dr. Morton Cowan, Chief, Allergy Immunology and Blood and Marrow Transplant Division, UCSF Children’s Hospital SA Laura Robinson, Senior Team Leader, Evidence Response Team, FBI Newark Field Office

SSA Rex Stockham, Program Manager for FBI Laboratory’s Forensic Canine Program

SA James Margolin, FBI Office of Public Affairs, New York Field Office

SSA Gavin Shea, FBI White Collar Squad, Long Island Resident Agency

Sharon L. Dunn, Department of Pediatrics, Hematology/Oncology, University of Chicago

Detective Mike Oliver, retired NYPD

Simon Jorna, owner of Simon’s Beach Bakery Café, Westhampton Beach, Long Island, New York

Michael Greene, Simon’s Beach Bakery Café and tour guide of “Amanda’s” apartment

And to a very special core of people:

Adam Wilson, the best (and most deeply missed) editorial partner any author could ask for

Valerie Gray, who stepped in at the crisis hour and finished the process with grace, enthusiasm and commitment

Andrea Cirillo and Christina Hogrebe, my incredible agents and diehard advocates

Peggy Gordijn, the quiet force of nature who stays in the background and moves mountains

And most of all my family, who, every day and in every way, give me the love, the incentive and the creative input to make each book the very best it can be.

Thank you all. You’re the very best of the best.

CHAPTER ONE

December

Manhattan

Amanda Gleason gently rocked her infant son in her arms.

A new baby was truly the reaffirmation of life. If she didn’t know that before this moment, she knew it now. He was her child, her miracle.

Her responsibility.

She hadn’t planned on facing motherhood alone. In fact, when Paul had disappeared from the picture, she hadn’t even known she was pregnant. Maybe if she had, maybe if she could have told him, things would have turned out differently.

But they hadn’t.

And now the weight of the world was on her shoulders. Decisions had to be made. Pressure she’d never even imagined. And a bittersweet pain that came every time she held Justin in her arms.

She touched his downy head with one finger, stroked the peach fuzz of his hair. As she whispered softly to him, his eyes opened wide and he stared at her intently, visibly fascinated by the sound of her voice. She gazed into those eyes—Paul’s eyes—and her chest tightened. They were a lighter brown than Paul’s, probably because they had yet to mature to their true color. But the shape, the lids, even the thick fringe of lashes—those were all Paul’s. As was his nose, a tiny version of Paul’s bold, straight nose with the slender nostrils. He even had the dimple in his cheek that was Paul’s. Other than his golden-brown hair color and small, pursed mouth—both of which he’d inherited from her—he was very much Paul’s son. And even at three weeks old, he was developing a personality—easygoing like Paul, inquisitive like her. He spent hours staring at his fingers, opening and closing them with a fascinated expression. And he was always looking around, seemingly transfixed by the world.

Thank God he didn’t know how much of a battlefield his world really was.

“Ms. Gleason?” A young nurse touched her gently on the shoulder. “Why don’t you get something to eat? Maybe take a walk? You haven’t done either all day.” She reached for the baby. “Justin will be in good hands. You’ve got to take care of yourself or you won’t be able to take care of him.”

Numbly, Amanda nodded. She held Justin for one more brief, desperate moment, then kissed his soft cheek and handed him over to the nurse.