Chương 3
“The fountain itself is visible. The audio isn’t useful.”
“Leah has the phone recording,” Ethan said.
“She’s already spoken to us.”
“Did she give you the video?”
“She preserved it and provided a copy.”
Ethan nodded.
Martinez looked at Maya.
“Ms. Bennett, when your daughter wakes up, we are not going to question her tonight.”
“Good.”
“We may need a child forensic interview later, depending on where the investigation goes. We’ll coordinate that carefully.”
Maya’s mouth tightened.
“Ryan didn’t push her.”
Martinez waited.
Ethan looked at Maya.
She kept staring at the blanket over Sophie’s legs.
“He told Vanessa to remove us.”
“Vanessa?”
“The wedding coordinator. Vanessa Price. She works for the Cole family sometimes.”
Ethan’s head turned.
“You know her?”
Maya looked at him.
“She was there that night.”
“What night?”
Maya did not answer.
Officer Martinez noticed the silence.
“I can come back.”
“No,” Ethan said.
“Yes,” Maya said at the same time.
They looked at each other.
Martinez stood.
“I’ll give you a few minutes.”
When the door shut, Ethan remained beside Sophie’s bed.
Maya sat in a vinyl chair under a television nobody had turned on.
“What night?”
She rubbed both hands together.
“Maya.”
“The night Ryan found out.”
Ethan stared at her.
“Found out what?”
She looked toward Sophie.
He understood before she said it.
“That he was her father.”
Ethan’s stomach tightened.
“You told me you and Ryan handled it alone.”
“We did.”
“You said there was one test. One conversation.”
“There was.”
“Then why was Vanessa there?”
“She drove him.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Maya stood and immediately winced because of her bandaged foot.
Ethan almost stepped toward her.
He stopped himself.
She noticed.
That seemed to hurt her.
“Sit down,” he said.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re bleeding through the gauze.”
She looked at her foot and sat.
For a while, the only sound was Sophie’s breathing and the occasional roll of a hospital cart in the corridor.
Maya tucked wet hair behind her ear.
“Ryan brought Vanessa because he didn’t want his own car seen outside my building.”
Ethan stared at her.
“When was this?”
“November. Six years ago.”
“Sophie was what, five months?”
“Almost six.”
“And I was in Denver.”
Maya nodded.
Ethan had been working a three-month contract for an engineering firm that had promised to turn temporary work into a permanent partnership position. He had flown home every other weekend.
He remembered calling Maya from the hotel each night.
He remembered asking whether Sophie had rolled over yet.
He remembered Maya saying no.
Then Sophie rolled over the day after he returned, and Ethan had joked that she had waited for him.
He gripped the metal rail beside the hospital bed.
“What happened?”
“Ryan had been asking questions.”
“Why?”
“He saw a picture.”
“What picture?”
“One your dad put online. Sophie at your parents’ house.”
Ethan almost laughed.
Thomas, who claimed not to understand social media, posted photographs of family events with the obsessive regularity of a man curating an annual report.
“What did Ryan see?”
“Her eyes.”
Ethan looked at Sophie.
Her eyes were closed.
Ryan’s eyes were hazel.
So were hers.
Ethan had brown eyes.
Maya’s were dark brown.
He had once called Sophie’s eyes a genetic lottery.
Maya continued.
“He knew the timing.”
“You told him?”
“No. He remembered.”
Ethan pressed the heels of his hands against his forehead.
“So he contacted you.”
“Yes.”
“And you tested.”
“Yes.”
“And then?”
Maya’s voice thinned.
“He asked what I wanted.”
“What did you say?”
“That I didn’t know.”
“Maya.”
“I had a five-month-old baby, Ethan. You were calling me from a hotel every night telling me you were trying to get us health insurance through a better job. I had not slept more than four hours in a row since May. I didn’t know what I wanted.”
He looked at her.
She was crying now, but silently.
He hated that a part of him wanted her to cry harder.
That part embarrassed him.
“What did Ryan want?”
“For nothing to change.”
Ethan nodded slowly.
Of course.
“He said you were already her father. He said a test didn’t change who was getting up at two in the morning. He said he wasn’t asking for custody.”
“How generous.”
“He was scared.”
“Stop defending him.”
“I’m not.”
“You always say that right before you explain why he did something.”
Maya wiped her cheek with the heel of her hand.
“That isn’t fair.”
“No?”
“No.”
“Six years, Maya.”
“I know.”
“My brother.”
“I know.”
“My daughter.”
“I know.”
“No. You know the sentences. I don’t think you know what they mean in my head yet.”
She stared at him.
He turned away before he said something cruel enough that neither of them could take it back.
Sophie moved in the bed.
Both adults stopped.
She did not wake.
Maya lowered her voice.
“Vanessa sat in the car during most of it. Ryan brought a document.”
Ethan turned.
“What document?”
“A confidentiality agreement.”
He blinked.
“What?”
“He said it was to protect everyone.”
“You signed an NDA about who fathered our child?”
“No.”
The answer came sharp enough to surprise him.
“I refused.”
“What did you sign?”
Her silence changed the room.
Ethan felt it.
“Maya.”
“A letter.”
“What letter?”
She looked at the floor.
“Ryan agreed that he would never seek parental rights unless I initiated contact about Sophie. He agreed he wouldn’t tell anyone. I wrote that I would not identify him publicly as her biological father without discussing it with him first, unless there was a medical or legal need.”
“You wrote?”
“His lawyer drafted it. I changed parts.”
“His lawyer.”
“Yes.”
“And you had a lawyer?”
“No.”
Ethan laughed once.
It sounded ugly in the small room.
“Jesus Christ.”
“I was scared.”
“You keep saying that like fear is a notarized document.”
She stood again.
May you like
This time she stayed standing despite her foot.
“You want me to say I was stupid? Fine. I was stupid. You want me to say I was a coward? I was. You want me to say I hurt you? I did. But don’t turn me into some woman sitting in a room making calm, calculated decisions. I was postpartum and terrified and in love with you, and the thing I thought would destroy us was sitting across from me wearing your brother’s face.”
