Chương 4
She burped him against her shoulder.
Nobody spoke while Noah released a tiny, indignant belch.
Margaret covered her mouth.
Rachel looked at her.
For one strange second, both women nearly smiled.
Then reality returned.
Rachel put the bottle back to Noah’s mouth.
“What did the test show?”
David answered.
“That Vanessa is not his genetic mother.”
Vanessa’s eyes closed.
Rachel stared.
“And me?”
“We didn’t test you.”
“Why not?”
David’s face hardened with shame.
“Because I would have needed your DNA without telling you why.”
Rachel waited.
“And stealing my medical reality was where you drew the ethical line?”
He accepted that without flinching.
“Yes.”
She hated him for making the answer simple.
“So you know Vanessa carried him but isn’t genetically his mother.”
“Yes.”
“You don’t know whether I’m his genetic mother.”
“No.”
“And you?”
“I tested myself.”
Rachel’s throat tightened.
“You said he isn’t yours.”
“He isn’t.”
The baby between them drank his milk.
Rachel looked down at his face.
People had told her Noah had David’s eyebrows.
People saw what they expected.
She had seen it too.
She had joked about it.
Your father’s eyebrows, poor kid.
She had said that while changing him on their bedroom floor.
She could suddenly remember exactly how David had looked.
He had turned away to pick up a diaper.
At the time, she had thought he was smiling.
Now she wondered.
“Who else knows?”
“The clinic’s attorney,” David said. “A reproductive endocrinologist. The genetic counselor. Vanessa. Me.”
“And nobody thought the woman raising him needed to know?”
“The clinic wanted to tell you.”
Vanessa’s voice carried a new bitterness.
“David threatened them.”
Rachel looked at him.
He shook his head.
“I didn’t threaten them.”
“You had your attorney send a letter.”
“I told them they weren’t to contact Rachel until we understood what happened.”
“That is a threat when it comes from a Morgan attorney.”
“Vanessa—”
“She deserves the ugly version.”
Rachel watched her husband.
“What attorney?”
David did not answer immediately.
“Caleb Ross.”
Rachel knew the name.
Caleb handled contracts for Morgan Hospitality Group.
She had eaten dinner with him twice.
His wife had sent Noah a stuffed bear.
The room tilted though the train had not.
“You involved the family company?”
“No. Caleb represented me privately.”
“Does the company pay him?”
“Yes.”
“Then you involved the company.”
Margaret said, “David.”
He looked at his mother.
She shook her head.
Not angry.
Disappointed.
It seemed to land harder.
Rachel stood.
Noah had finished the bottle.
“Where are you going?” David asked.
“My compartment.”
“Rachel, please.”
“I need my phone.”
“I’ll get it.”
She laughed.
“You really don’t understand where we are now.”
She walked toward the connecting door.
David moved aside.
Vanessa remained seated.
As Rachel passed her, Vanessa whispered, “I’m sorry.”
Rachel stopped.
For a moment she considered saying something cruel.
She had several choices.
You should be.
Stay away from him.
I hate you.
Instead she looked at Vanessa’s empty hands.
Eight months ago those hands had held Noah first.
That fact entered Rachel like a splinter.
She continued walking.
The corridor outside the lounge rocked gently beneath her feet. Brass fixtures threw warm pools of light along dark wood paneling. Somewhere farther down the train, a child complained that the Wi-Fi had stopped working. His father told him they were in the mountains. The child said that wasn’t an excuse.
Rachel almost laughed.
Then Noah tugged her necklace.
“I know,” she whispered.
She reached their sleeping compartment and locked the door behind her.
For the first time since the wineglass fell, she was alone with her son.
She sat on the edge of the bed.
Noah looked at her.
His lower lip was wet with milk.
Rachel wiped it with her thumb.
“You’re Noah,” she said.
He blinked.
“That part isn’t changing.”
Her voice broke.
Noah smiled.
It was not a meaningful smile. He had no idea what she had said. He was eight months old and pleased because her face was close.
Rachel pressed her forehead against his.
She cried then.
Quietly.
Not the way people cried in movies. There was no release in it. Her nose ran. Her shoulders hurt from holding herself rigid. She had to stop halfway through because Noah became frightened by the change in her breathing.
“Sorry.”
She wiped her face.
“Sorry, buddy.”
Someone knocked.
Rachel stiffened.
“Who?”
“Margaret.”
Rachel hesitated, then opened the door.
Margaret stood in the corridor holding Rachel’s phone and diaper bag.
“David was going to bring these,” she said. “I told him that would be an exceptionally stupid idea.”
Rachel took them.
“Thank you.”
Margaret did not leave.
Rachel looked at her.
“Did you really not know?”
“No.”
Rachel searched her face.
Margaret endured it.
“I knew Vanessa was pregnant,” she said. “Obviously. She told me she was carrying a child for you and David.”
Rachel frowned.
“What?”
Margaret went pale.
“You didn’t know that?”
“No.”
“Oh.”
The small word carried enormous damage.
Rachel opened the door wider.
“Come in.”
Margaret entered.
Rachel locked the door again.
“What exactly did Vanessa tell you?”
“That you and David had asked her to be a gestational carrier.”
Rachel stared.
“I never asked her.”
Margaret sat slowly.
“She said you didn’t want people discussing it because of the miscarriages.”
“I didn’t know she was pregnant.”
Margaret looked genuinely ill.
“How did you think Noah was born?”
“I was pregnant.”
Silence.
Margaret stared at her.
Rachel felt a new terror.
“What?”
“You were pregnant?”
“Yes.”
Margaret stood.
“No.”
“What do you mean, no?”
“I saw Vanessa pregnant.”
“And I was pregnant.”
Margaret shook her head as if refusing a physical object.
Rachel grabbed her phone.
Her fingers were trembling so badly she mistyped the passcode twice.
She opened her photographs.
Eight months earlier.
Hospital.
There she was.
Rachel in a gown.
Rachel holding newborn Noah.
David beside her.
Her own face gray with exhaustion.
She thrust the phone toward Margaret.
May you like
“I gave birth to him.”
Margaret stared at the photograph.
