Chương 8
“Laura’s.”
“What time?”
Rachel glanced at Cynthia.
“I’d have to check the chart.”
“No, you said you saw me.”
“I did.”
“Then when?”
Mara stepped between them slightly, not enough to block Daniel but enough to make him notice.
“Danny, don’t.”
“I’m asking her a question.”
“You’re crowding her.”
Daniel looked down and saw that Mara was right.
He had moved within two feet of Rachel without realizing it.
He stepped back.
“Sorry.”
Rachel folded her arms.
“It was shortly before midnight.”
Daniel’s anger gave way to confusion.
“I wasn’t here shortly before midnight.”
Mara turned.
“What?”
“I left around eleven twenty.”
Rachel shook her head.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“You came out of the room, walked past the nurses’ station, and went toward the elevators.”
“I went home.”
“At eleven twenty?”
“Something like that.”
“Then you came back.”
“No.”
Rachel’s confidence weakened for the first time.
Daniel felt it happen and hated the relief that rose in him.
“Check the cameras,” he said.
One of the security officers, a broad man with a shaved head and reading glasses hanging from his collar, spoke from behind Cynthia.
“We’re doing that.”
Daniel turned.
“Good.”
“The hallway camera doesn’t cover the patient-room doors.”
“But it covers the elevators.”
“It does.”
“So you’ll see whether I came back.”
The officer gave a careful nod.
“We should.”
Mara looked at Daniel.
“Where did you go?”
“Home.”
“Why?”
“Laura told me to.”
Rachel frowned.
“She told you to leave?”
“She wanted her charger.”
Mara stared at him.
“You left your wife in labor to get a charger?”
“She wasn’t in active labor yet.”
“She was in a hospital having your baby.”
“I know where I was.”
The words came out harsher than he intended.
Owen stirred.
Daniel lowered his voice.
“She’d been admitted for observation, they said it could be hours, and her phone was almost dead.”
Mara’s expression did not soften.
“You couldn’t buy a charger downstairs?”
“The gift shop was closed.”
“You could have asked me.”
“At eleven at night?”
“You borrowed eight hundred dollars from me at six in the morning.”
Daniel went still.
Cynthia looked from one sibling to the other but said nothing.
Mara’s face changed as soon as the sentence was out.
“That’s not relevant.”
“It’s apparently relevant now.”
“Daniel.”
“You want to inventory all the ways I screwed up this year, go ahead.”
“I’m trying to understand what happened.”
“So am I.”
Rachel shifted against the wall.
“I’m sure it was you.”
Daniel looked at her.
“Then you’re wrong.”
The bald security officer raised a hand before either could continue.
“We’re not settling that in the hallway.”
“Fine,” Daniel said.
“Show me the video.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Of course.”
“That footage is part of an internal review.”
“It’s footage of me.”
“If you’re on it.”
Daniel stared at him.
The officer’s expression remained neutral.
Cynthia stepped forward.
“Laura is waiting.”
The reminder changed everything in Daniel’s body.
His shoulders dropped.
His anger did not disappear, but it lost its direction.
He looked at the closed door twenty feet away.
“Does she know I’m here?”
“Yes.”
“Does she want me in the room?”
Cynthia hesitated.
“She agreed to speak with you.”
“That’s not the same thing.”
“No.”
Daniel looked at Owen.
His son had one fist tucked beneath his chin.
There was a crescent scratch on his cheek from a fingernail Daniel had been too nervous to trim.
“Can Mara take him for five minutes?”
Mara blinked.
“You trust me now?”
“No.”
He met her eyes.
“But I trust you with him.”
The distinction hurt her.
He saw it.
She reached for Owen anyway.
Daniel’s arms resisted before his mind did.
For five days, someone had always been asking to take the baby from him for a weight check, a hearing screen, blood work, an examination, a bath, a feeding consultation.
Each time Owen disappeared through a doorway, Daniel had counted minutes.
Now he forced his arms to loosen.
“Support his head.”
Mara gave him a look.
“I know.”
“He ate about forty minutes ago.”
“I know how babies work.”
“No, you know how other people’s babies work.”
“Daniel.”
“Okay.”
He transferred Owen carefully.
The absence of the baby’s weight against his chest felt immediate and wrong.
Mara tucked Owen close.
Her expression softened despite herself.
“Hey, tiny man.”
Daniel looked away.
Cynthia opened Laura’s door.
“Just you.”
He entered.
The room smelled faintly of antiseptic and the lavender lotion Laura had packed because she hated hospital soap.
For five days, the lotion bottle had sat unopened beside the sink.
Now it was on the bedside table.
Laura was propped against two pillows.
Her dark hair had been brushed but not well, and one side was flattened near the back.
Bruises covered the inside of her left arm.
A hospital blanket was pulled to her waist.
She looked smaller than she had on Monday, not merely thinner but somehow reduced by what her body had survived.
Daniel stopped near the door.
Laura’s eyes moved over him.
“You came back.”
He could not tell whether she sounded relieved.
“You asked me to.”
“Where’s Owen?”
“With Mara.”
Laura closed her eyes.
Her mouth tightened.
“Why?”
“Because I wanted to talk to you first.”
“I asked for my baby.”
“He’s ten feet away.”
“Then bring him in.”
Daniel remained where he was.
Laura opened her eyes again.
“Daniel.”
“Did you tell them you’re afraid of me?”
Her gaze shifted toward the window.
“That’s what you came in here to ask?”
“I came because I was told not to take our son home.”
“Don’t call it our home right now.”
He absorbed that.
Outside the room, a cart rattled past.
Someone laughed at the nurses’ station.
Daniel pulled the visitor chair away from the wall but did not sit.
“Did you tell Mara I was taking pills?”
“Yes.”
“I’m not.”
Laura’s eyes returned to him.
“Okay.”
The quiet agreement infuriated him.
“Don’t do that.”
May you like
“Do what?”
“Say okay like you’re talking to somebody who doesn’t know what he’s doing.”
