Chương 4
Rachel said, “Ask.”
So she did.
Rachel described the door.
The key.
Daniel’s key.
Margaret touching his wrist.
The dispatcher’s earlier call.
“Did anyone threaten you before today?”
“No.”
“Any conflict with your husband?”
Rachel stared at the blanket.
“That depends on what counts.”
“Anything involving physical violence?”
“No.”
“Threats?”
“No.”
“Controlling behavior?”
Rachel almost said no.
The word arrived automatically.
Then she thought of their apartment lease, which Daniel had renewed after they agreed to move.
The obstetric appointment he missed because his mother “needed” him.
The nursery furniture Margaret ordered after Rachel had already chosen something else.
Daniel apologizing each time.
Daniel promising each time.
Daniel explaining that his mother was difficult.
Daniel saying the easiest thing for everyone was to let Margaret have this one.
One became twelve.
“No,” Rachel said finally. “Not the way you mean.”
Vasquez did not correct her.
“Who knew about the bleeding three weeks ago?”
“My doctor. Daniel. Leah.”
“Margaret?”
“No.”
“You’re sure?”
Rachel looked at her.
“I didn’t tell her.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Rachel felt something tighten beneath her ribs.
“I don’t know.”
Vasquez asked whether Daniel had access to her medical records.
“Yes. Emergency access. He’s my husband.”
“Before today?”
“Yes.”
“Did Mrs. Monroe have access?”
“No.”
“Did anyone at the estate know you had been advised to seek immediate care if bleeding happened again?”
“No.”
A pause.
Rachel looked toward the black window.
“Unless Daniel told them.”
At six that morning, Leah returned from the NICU carrying two coffees she knew Rachel could not drink.
“I forgot,” she said.
Rachel stared at the cups.
“You bought me coffee after abdominal surgery.”
“Apparently trauma has made me stupid.”
“You were stupid before.”
“That’s reassuring.”
Leah sat.
For a while neither spoke.
The sun rose behind the hospital parking garage without any beauty at all.
Cars arrived.
A maintenance worker emptied a trash can.
A man in blue scrubs stood beside his pickup eating something from a foil wrapper.
Rachel watched him because his life looked uncomplicated from six floors away.
“Evelyn?” she asked.
“Still stable.”
“You saw her?”
“Through the glass.”
Rachel nodded.
Leah put the coffees on the windowsill.
“Daniel asked me to give you something.”
Rachel’s body went rigid.
“No.”
“I didn’t take it.”
She relaxed slightly.
“What was it?”
“His phone.”
Rachel looked at her.
“He said the police can have it, you can have it, whoever. He said there are messages you need to see.”
“What messages?”
“He wouldn’t tell me.”
“Of course not.”
Leah picked at a loose thread on her dress.
“He looks awful.”
Rachel turned toward the window.
“I don’t care.”
“Okay.”
“I don’t.”
“I said okay.”
“Stop saying okay like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you know I’m lying.”
Leah leaned back.
“I’m too tired to know anything.”
Rachel stared at the maintenance worker below.
He had finished breakfast and was now wiping crumbs from his shirt.
“Did you know?”
“About what?”
“That he told Margaret about the bleeding.”
Leah was quiet.
Rachel turned.
Leah’s face answered before she did.
“You knew.”
“Not exactly.”
“What does that mean?”
“Daniel called me yesterday morning.”
Rachel felt cold.
“Why?”
“He said you’d seen a little blood when you woke up.”
Rachel closed her eyes.
She remembered the bathroom in the guest cottage where she and the bridesmaids had dressed.
A pink streak on toilet paper.
So little she had almost convinced herself it was nothing.
She had told Daniel because he was her husband and because fear shared with another person sometimes became manageable.
Daniel had wanted to call the hospital.
Rachel refused.
The wedding was in six hours.
She told him she would sit, hydrate, call Dr. Hsu’s office.
The nurse told her that with her history she should come in for evaluation.
Rachel said she would.
Then she didn’t.
The admission had been following her through the night like a shadow.
She had made that choice.
No one else.
She had wanted one normal day so badly that she had treated a warning as an inconvenience.
“What did Daniel say to you?” Rachel asked.
“That you were refusing to go in. He wanted me to convince you.”
“You never said anything.”
“You told me you had called your doctor and they weren’t worried.”
Rachel looked away.
Leah understood.
“Oh, Rachel.”
“Don’t.”
“You lied to me?”
“I edited.”
“You lied.”
“I was getting married.”
“You were bleeding.”
“It stopped.”
“That doesn’t make what Daniel did okay.”
“No.”
“But you should have gone.”
“I know.”
Leah rubbed both hands over her face.
“So he called you,” Rachel said. “Then what?”
“He said his mother knew.”
Rachel looked at her again.
“What?”
“He said he made the mistake of telling her.”
“Why?”
“Because she saw you cancel the family photographs before the ceremony and demanded to know why.”
Rachel laughed without humor.
“So he told her my medical history.”
“He told her you’d had some bleeding.”
“That was mine.”
“I know.”
“That was mine to tell.”
“I know.”
Leah’s eyes filled.
Rachel hated that too.
Everyone’s tears felt like extra work.
“What else?”
“He said Margaret wanted a private doctor at the house in case anything happened.”
Rachel’s mouth went dry.
“What doctor?”
“I don’t know.”
“And you didn’t think that was strange?”
“I thought rich people were strange.”
Despite herself, Rachel looked at her.
Leah gave a helpless shrug.
“You people had three kinds of butter at dinner.”
“I’m not one of them.”
Leah did not answer.
That silence hurt worse than if she had.
Rachel looked back toward the window.
By nine, Detective Vasquez returned.
This time she had Daniel’s phone.
“We have his consent to review it,” she said. “I need to ask whether you’re willing to look at a message thread.”
Rachel’s stomach tightened.
“With Margaret?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t want summaries.”
Vasquez handed her printed pages rather than the phone.
Rachel understood why.
Evidence.
Chain of custody.
May you like
Real life had rules even when her marriage apparently did not.
The messages began at 8:12 the previous morning.
