Chương 11
“I don’t know whether she knew he was committing fraud.”
I hated uncertainty.
My career had been built around reducing it.
Identify the intrusion.
Isolate the system.
Trace the breach.
Contain the damage.
Families did not work like networks.
There was no clean log showing the moment a mother decided one child’s desperation mattered more than another child’s safety.
Maya returned an hour later carrying two coffees she was not supposed to have near my bed.
She looked exhausted and happy at the same time.
“Your daughter is extremely opinionated.”
“You spoke to her?”
“She screamed during a diaper change.”
“That’s not an opinion.”
“You didn’t hear the tone.”
She handed me my phone charger although it was already plugged in.
“How is she?”
“Still on CPAP.”
I must have looked frightened because Maya immediately added, “The nurse said she’s doing what they expect for her gestational age.”
“Did she say when I can see her?”
“As soon as you can get into a wheelchair.”
I reached for the bed rail.
Maya put a hand on my shoulder.
“No.”
“You literally just said—”
“I said when you can get into a wheelchair.”
“I can.”
“You currently look like a Victorian ghost.”
“Help me sit up.”
“Absolutely not.”
A nurse entered before our argument could develop.
Her name was Beth, and she had the calm indifference of someone who had watched thousands of new mothers attempt impossible things after surgery.
“Not yet,” she said.
“I didn’t ask.”
“You were about to.”
“I need to see my baby.”
“You will.”
“When?”
“When you can sit up without your blood pressure dropping.”
“Can we test that?”
Beth smiled.
“In a little while.”
I disliked her immediately.
Twenty minutes later, she became my favorite person when she helped me sit on the edge of the bed.
The room tilted.
I gripped her arm.
“Don’t pass out.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“That’s good because paperwork after a floor incident is annoying.”
Maya laughed.
I glared at both of them.
My blood pressure held.
Beth helped me into a wheelchair.
Every movement pulled against my incision.
I discovered muscles I had never respected before.
By the time Maya pushed me into the hallway, I was sweating.
“I feel fantastic,” I said.
“You look fantastic.”
“Liar.”
“You look expensive.”
“That’s better.”
The NICU doors required Maya to buzz us in.
Inside, the light was softer.
Machines hummed around rows of incubators.
Parents sat in chairs with the frozen, exhausted posture of people whose entire world had been reduced to numbers on monitors.
A man in a Knicks sweatshirt was asleep with his head against a wall.
A woman near the window was pumping milk while reading emails.
Nobody looked dramatic.
They looked tired.
That frightened me more.
My daughter was in the third bay.
The incubator looked too large for her.
Maya parked me beside it.
For several seconds, I could not speak.
A nurse named Tessa opened one of the side ports.
“You can touch her.”
I slipped my hand inside.
My daughter’s fingers were smaller than the first joint of my thumb.
I placed one finger against her palm.
She closed her hand around it.
Everything in me stopped.
“Hi, Bean.”
Her eyes stayed closed.
The little mask over her nose made soft rhythmic sounds.
I sat there for nearly an hour.
Nobody asked me about money.
Nobody asked about Ethan.
Nobody cared who owned a penthouse.
I watched my daughter breathe.
Sometimes that was all she did.
Sometimes she stretched one leg.
Once she made a tiny grimace that looked exactly like my father’s expression when restaurants charged for bread.
The resemblance annoyed me.
I loved it anyway.
When I returned to my room, Reeves was waiting.
He stood when he saw the wheelchair.
“Is this a good time?”
“No.”
He waited.
“But come in.”
Maya helped me back into bed and disappeared in search of food.
Reeves closed the door.
“We recovered the second phone.”
“Chloe cooperated?”
“She gave investigators written consent to enter the suite and retrieve it after speaking with counsel.”
“Good.”
“We also located Ethan.”
My hand stopped on the blanket.
“Where?”
“At a parking garage in Jersey City.”
“Was he running?”
“We don’t characterize intentions before we establish them.”
“He was in New Jersey.”
“So are several million innocent people.”
Despite myself, I smiled.
“Is he arrested?”
“Yes.”
The word landed quietly.
No music.
No satisfaction.
Just yes.
“For what?”
“Initial charges related to wire fraud, identity theft, and fraudulent loan documentation.”
“Initial?”
“The investigation is ongoing.”
“My mother?”
Reeves took out his notebook.
“We interviewed both your parents.”
“Together?”
“Separately.”
That mattered.
“What did she say?”
“I can’t give you the contents of an active interview.”
“You came here for something.”
“Yes.”
He sat.
“Your mother claims she believed the deed-transfer documents were legitimate paperwork you had previously agreed to sign.”
I laughed.
The incision punished me.
“She watched him demand my signature.”
“I know.”
“She told me I didn’t need four bedrooms.”
“I know.”
“She told me to move to Queens.”
“I know.”
His repetition stopped me.
“You spoke to Chloe.”
“Yes.”
“And you have the phone.”
“Yes.”
“So you know Mom was talking to Ethan.”
“We know they communicated.”
“About me.”
“Yes.”
“What did the phone show?”
Reeves looked at me for several seconds.
“Claire, I need you to answer something first.”
I hated when investigators asked questions they already half understood.
“Fine.”
“Did your mother know you had title monitoring on the penthouse?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Did Ethan?”
“No.”
“Did anyone in your family know Jonathan Bell would be alerted by changes to your property records?”
“No.”
He wrote something.
“Why?”
“Because there’s a message from your mother to Ethan sent the morning the fraudulent deed was filed.”
The pain medication suddenly seemed less effective.
“What does it say?”
He did not answer immediately.
“Daniel.”
It was the first time I had used his first name.
May you like
His eyes met mine.
“She wrote, ‘Do it before Claire starts checking things for the baby.’”
