Chapter 20 - THE TWILIGHT OVER THE HUDSON
As evening approached, the museum doors closed to the public, and the galleries grew hushed and still.
Rafe and Tessa walked out onto the paved plaza in front of the Met, watching the city lights flicker on across Central Park as the winter twilight bled from deep violet to a starry, midnight indigo.
Nora had woken up refreshed and was now walking between them, holding each of their hands in her small ones, swinging her arms back and forth as they made their way toward the waiting car.
The black sedan was parked at the curb, its engine idling quietly, the driver holding the rear door open for them.
As they slid into the luxurious leather interior of the backseat, with Nora nestled safely between them clutching her stuffed rabbit, the driver pulled smoothly away from the curb into the steady flow of evening traffic.
Tessa leaned her head against Rafe’s shoulder, watching the glowing skyscrapers of Manhattan slide past the tinted window.
The journey that had started twelve months ago with eleven dollars and seventy cents, a desperate mother in a freezing Chicago alleyway, and a locked door in a dangerous mafia-controlled restaurant had finally reached its destination.
Not an end, but a beginning.
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Rafe wrapped his arm around her shoulders, pulling her close, while his other hand reached out to gently stroke Nora’s soft hair as she drifted off to sleep against his lap.
The city rushed past outside, indifferent, loud, and endless. But inside the car, surrounded by the warmth of the family they had forged from the ruins of their pasts, there was only peace.
