Chương 14
"I'm listening to it for the first time."
Martha hung up.
Twenty minutes later, Kayla texted me.
"I heard she's flying back tomorrow."
I wrote, "How?"
"Because she called me screaming."
Then another message.
"She thinks I sent you screenshots."
I stared at the screen.
"Did you tell her you did?"
"No."
"Why did you?"
The answer took a while.
Finally Kayla wrote, "Because I paid for part of that trip too."
I sat up.
"How much?"
"Two thousand."
"Why?"
"She said she'd repay me when you transferred."
My mouth went dry.
Another message followed.
"She owes other people too."
I typed, "Dangerous people?"
Kayla replied almost immediately.
"No."
Then, "Just regular people who are sick of being lied to."
That was somehow worse.
There had been a grain of truth inside Martha's story.
Penny did owe people.
They were angry.
She had been under pressure.
But the danger had been invented because ordinary consequences were apparently not dramatic enough to unlock my bank account.
I saved Kayla's messages.
That afternoon, a civilian family-law attorney named Rachel Kim returned my call.
She agreed to review the situation and explained that if I was being considered for temporary kinship placement, I needed to separate two questions.
"Do you want to punish your sister?"
"No."
The answer came too fast.
Rachel noticed.
"Try again."
I stared at the ceiling.
"Sometimes."
"Good."
I frowned.
"Good?"
"Honest is useful."
She continued.
"Second question."
"Okay."
"Can you provide stability for a child without turning the child into evidence against the parent?"
That one hurt.
"I think so."
"Think harder."
I looked toward Hazel's bassinet.
"If Lily stayed here, I wouldn't question her about Penny."
"Good."
"I wouldn't make her pick sides."
"Good."
"I wouldn't promise she could stay forever."
"Very good."
I swallowed.
"And I wouldn't tell her things about her mother she doesn't need to know."
Rachel paused.
"That answer matters."
I wrote it down even though I already knew the words.
Before we ended the call, she advised me to secure all financial records, change passwords, and consider a formal police report regarding the old credit account if the creditor confirmed unauthorized activity.
I spent the rest of the afternoon doing boring things.
Password resets.
Credit freezes.
Downloading statements.
Changing security questions Martha might know.
By dinner, I was more exhausted from administrative work than childbirth seemed capable of making me.
Rosa brought soup.
Ben dropped off a package Daniel had ordered months earlier.
Inside was a white-noise machine shaped like a small egg.
Rosa held it up.
"This cost money?"
"Probably too much."
"It sounds like an airplane bathroom."
Hazel loved it.
At nine forty-six that night, someone began pounding on my front door.
Not knocking.
Pounding.
Hazel startled awake and screamed.
I froze halfway across the living room.
Then Martha's voice came through the door.
"Maya, open this door."
My blood went cold.
She was not supposed to have access to the installation.
I grabbed my phone.
The door shook under another blow.
"Maya."
Then a child's voice cried outside.
"Aunt Maya."
Lily.
I moved before I had time to think.
I put Hazel in the bassinet, grabbed my phone, and triggered the security alert I had been shown how to use two days earlier.
Then I went to the door without opening it.
"Lily?"
"It's me."
Her voice broke on the second word.
Martha slammed her palm against the wood.
"Open this door right now."
"Step away from it."
"You are not giving me orders."
"I already told you not to come here."
"She needs somewhere to sleep."
"Then why didn't Penny bring her?"
A pause.
Long enough for Lily to start crying harder.
Martha answered too quickly.
"Because Penny is dealing with enough."
"Where is Penny?"
"That is none of your business."
"It became my business when you dragged an eight-year-old to my house at almost ten at night."
"I did not drag her."
Lily said nothing.
That silence was worse than an accusation.
I checked the camera feed on my phone.
Martha stood directly in front of the door in a cream coat, one hand clamped around Lily's wrist.
Lily had her stuffed rabbit tucked beneath her other arm.
She was still wearing travel clothes.
No suitcase.
No backpack.
Nothing except the rabbit.
My anger sharpened into something cleaner.
"Let go of her wrist."
Martha looked directly at the camera.
"I cannot believe what you've become."
"Let go."
She did.
Lily immediately stepped away from her.
That told me enough.
I opened the door only after sliding the security chain into place.
The gap was four inches.
Lily's face appeared first.
Her eyes were swollen.
"Aunt Maya."
"I'm here."
Martha pushed toward the opening.
The chain caught.
"Take that ridiculous thing off."
"No."
Her expression changed.
Not rage exactly.
Shock.
The kind people showed when a familiar machine stopped responding to the usual button.
"You are humiliating me in front of a child."
I looked at Lily.
She was staring at the floor.
"You did that yourself."
Martha's mouth tightened.
"Do you know what Penny has been through today?"
"No."
"She was questioned like a criminal."
"By whom?"
"Everybody."
"That isn't an answer."
"Police."
"CPS?"
"Yes."
"The court?"
Her face changed again.
There it was.
Something underneath the anger.
Fear.
"Why did you bring Lily here?"
"Because Penny cannot deal with her right now."
"Cannot or will not?"
"Maya."
"Where is Penny?"
"At a hotel."
"Here?"
"Yes."
"Why isn't Lily with Travis?"
Martha stared at me.
Then she looked toward the driveway.
I followed her gaze through the camera feed.
Her car was parked half on the curb.
No one else was inside.
"Does Travis know Lily is here?"
"That man has done enough damage."
"That's not what I asked."
"He's trying to steal her."
"He's her father."
"He's an alcoholic."
"He's sober."
"People like that don't change."
Lily flinched.
I saw it.
So did Martha.
Neither of us acknowledged it.
May you like
I lowered my voice.
"Lily, sweetheart, did your mom tell you that you were coming here?"
