Chương 10
“That’s different from knowing.”
Daniel looked down at the card.
He tried to reconstruct the trip home: the elevator, the parking garage, the cold steering wheel, the red light at Grant, the stupid argument replaying in his head.
He could see Laura’s charger on the kitchen counter.
He could see himself opening the junk drawer for a spare cable.
He could see the microwave clock showing 11:41.
The badge was nowhere in the memory.
“I don’t know.”
Harris nodded as if uncertainty itself had weight.
“Could someone have borrowed it?”
“No.”
“Could you have left it here?”
“I just said I don’t know.”
Mara came fully into the hallway and pulled Laura’s door nearly closed behind her.
“Owen’s asleep.”
Daniel looked toward the narrow opening.
“Is she okay?”
“She wants quiet.”
He nodded.
Mara glanced at Harris.
“What happens now?”
Harris adjusted his glasses.
“We preserve the footage, document what we have, and continue reviewing access records.”
“That man used Daniel’s badge.”
“Someone used a badge assigned to Daniel.”
“Same thing.”
“No,” Harris said.
“It isn’t.”
Daniel looked at him more carefully.
Harris was not defending him.
He was refusing to turn incomplete evidence into certainty.
After the last hour, that felt almost generous.
“Can you tell how the door was opened?” Daniel asked.
“The badge scan.”
“No, I mean whether someone actually used my physical badge or copied it.”
Harris shook his head.
“Not from the access log alone.”
“Can badges be copied?”
“I’m not going to speculate.”
“Could somebody have gotten another one with my name?”
“The visitor desk requires identification.”
“Requires and gets aren’t always the same thing.”
Harris’s expression changed by half a degree.
“You’re right.”
Cynthia stepped closer.
“Daniel, there’s another issue we need to address.”
He almost laughed.
“Of course there is.”
“Laura does not want Owen discharged with you today.”
“He was already discharged.”
“The hospital is reconsidering that decision.”
“Can a hospital just reconsider giving me my own kid?”
Cynthia kept her voice low.
“This is not a custody hearing.”
“You keep saying that right before telling me something that sounds exactly like custody.”
Mara said, “Maybe don’t fight about terminology right now.”
Daniel turned on her.
“You think terminology doesn’t matter?”
“I think Owen matters more.”
The sentence struck where she intended it to.
Daniel stepped back.
Cynthia waited until he looked at her again.
“Laura has asked that Owen remain here temporarily while she is evaluated and while we clarify what happened Monday night.”
“Evaluated for what?”
“I can’t discuss her medical care without her permission.”
“I’m her husband.”
“That doesn’t automatically give me permission to disclose everything she tells her treatment team.”
Daniel looked toward Laura’s door.
“She’s confused.”
“She may be.”
“She accused me of owning a jacket I threw away two months ago.”
“I heard you.”
“She described a room in our apartment that doesn’t exist.”
“I heard that too.”
“And you’re basing this on what she says?”
“We’re taking what she says seriously.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
“No.”
Cynthia’s answer came without defensiveness.
“We can take her seriously without assuming every detail is accurate.”
That took some of the argument away from him.
He hated how badly he needed someone in the building to say exactly that.
“What do you want me to do?”
“For tonight, agree to let Owen remain on the mother-baby unit.”
Daniel stared at her.
“Without me?”
“You may stay in the family waiting area while we work out visitation.”
“Visitation.”
“I know you don’t like the word.”
“I’m his father.”
“Yes.”
“Then I don’t visit him.”
Cynthia rubbed one thumb across the edge of her folder.
“If you leave with Owen again against Laura’s stated wishes, the hospital may contact county child protective services or law enforcement for guidance.”
“There it is.”
“I’m telling you because I don’t want you surprised.”
“Am I being accused of hurting him?”
“No.”
“Neglecting him?”
“No.”
“Then what exactly would you report?”
“A disputed infant discharge occurring in the context of a mother reporting fear, questions about substance use, and contradictory information about an incident preceding a medical emergency.”
Hearing the pieces assembled that way made Daniel feel sick.
Each fact had an explanation.
Together they sounded like a different man’s life.
Mara leaned against the wall.
“Let him stay tonight.”
Daniel looked at her.
“You think I should leave my five-day-old son in a hospital because somebody wore my jacket?”
“I think you should stop acting like every person here is your enemy.”
“You believed Laura before you believed me.”
“I believed she was scared.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have.”
He saw exhaustion beneath Mara’s anger.
Her hair was still tied in the careless knot she wore while driving, and she had mismatched socks above her sneakers.
She had probably left Dayton without packing anything.
Daniel resented her for coming and was suddenly grateful she had.
The combination made him tired.
“I need air.”
Cynthia said, “That’s fine.”
“I’m not leaving the building.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
He handed Harris the visitor badge.
“Check it.”
Harris took it carefully.
“For what?”
“Fingerprints, serial numbers, whatever you people do.”
“This isn’t a police lab.”
“Then figure out what you can figure out.”
Harris turned the badge over.
A small crack ran through one corner.
“Did you damage this?”
Daniel frowned.
“No.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
Harris pointed.
“This corner is cracked.”
Daniel took a closer look.
He had noticed the crack before.
Monday evening, Laura had complained about it scratching her wrist when Daniel leaned over the bed.
He had unclipped the badge and set it on the windowsill.
The memory arrived with such force that he spoke before thinking.
“I took it off.”
Everyone looked at him.
“When?”
“Monday.”
“What time?”
“I don’t know.”
He pressed his fingers against his forehead.
“Before I left.”
“Where did you put it?”
“In Laura’s room.”
Mara straightened.
Daniel could see it now.
May you like
The badge beside a paper cup.
Laura asking him to stop hovering.
