Excerpt from

Woman With A Past

By Josh Lockwood

Copyright 2009 by Josh Lockwood

She should have told him the truth ...

When he turned back to Molly, his eyes were crisp with anger.

"Lady, I've had Mike for six years now and he's never had so much as a sunburn. You show up and, within four days, he's being threatened with guns and knives. I want to know who you are, and I want to know now."

She couldn't meet his eyes. All the tenderness and that enticing iridescence had gone out of them. Instead, they flared at her like burning coals. She lowered her gaze to the tabletop, feeling her heart shrivel and die within her.

She should have told him the truth, she thought. She should have been honest with him from the beginning instead of playing out her stupid little role in her stupid little fantasy world. She realized, with a sudden emptiness in the pit of her stomach, that she had probably lost her one real chance for happiness.

"I'm Mike's mother."

Micheal's head snapped up in amazement at her words and there was nothing she could do to cushion the shock for the boy.

She was still in shock herself.

"You're what?"

"I'm Mike's mother," she said again.

"Mike's mother is in jail," Danny rasped from across the table.

Molly saw little Michael's eyes lift, squinting doubtfully at the man he considered his father. She felt the eyes of the canalmen shift to her then, saw the suspicion in them, and knew she had to face the truth of it sooner or later.

She also knew that time had come.