Chương 3
Daniel had thanked it.
He had given it access to his home.
His children.
His credit cards.
Their schedules.
He closed his eyes.
Caroline had once accused him of believing efficiency and care were the same thing.
It had happened during an argument about Sophie’s fourth-grade school orientation. Caroline had gone alone because Daniel had stayed at work to finish negotiations.
“You keep outsourcing the parts of your life that interrupt you,” she had said.
He had been angry for two days.
Then Caroline died giving birth to Noah three months later, and the sentence became one of those cruel little things the dead leave behind accidentally.
Daniel opened his eyes.
“Faster,” he told Marcus.
Marcus looked at the traffic.
“I’m doing what I can.”
Daniel almost said his name sharply.
Instead he nodded.
“Okay.”
It was the first useful thing he had done in several minutes.
Back at the mansion, Sophie heard the front-door lock release.
The sound traveled through the downstairs hall with a heavy mechanical click.
She lifted her head.
Vanessa stopped speaking in the kitchen.
For several seconds, there was only Noah’s crying.
Then came the low scrape of the front doors moving.
Sophie stood beside the crib.
She did not move toward the hallway.
Vanessa appeared at the nursery door.
“What did you do?”
Sophie’s back touched the crib.
“Nothing.”
“Did you call someone?”
“No.”
Vanessa looked at the camera.
The green light was on.
Her face changed.
It did not become frightened exactly.
Something smaller disappeared from it.
Certainty.
She stepped toward Sophie.
“Give me your phone.”
“I don’t have it.”
Vanessa knew that.
She had taken Sophie’s phone four days earlier because Sophie had “abused screen privileges.”
She checked the dresser anyway.
The sound of men’s voices rose from downstairs.
Then a short burst of police radio.
Vanessa went still.
Sophie looked at the hallway.
The mansion’s front doors opened fully.
Daniel entered first.
Two uniformed officers followed several feet behind him.
For a moment, no one spoke.
Daniel could hear Noah upstairs.
He moved toward the staircase.
Vanessa came out of the nursery carrying the baby before he reached the first landing.
Sophie followed behind her.
Daniel stopped.
Noah was crying against Vanessa’s shoulder now. Sophie’s face was pale. Her floral T-shirt was damp across the front, and one side of her ponytail had nearly come loose.
Daniel looked at her hands.
Red knuckles.
A small cut near her thumb.
He looked at Vanessa.
“Put Noah down.”
Vanessa stared at him.
“Daniel, what is this?”
One of the officers stepped slightly to the side.
“Ma’am, please remain where you are.”
Vanessa looked from the officer to Daniel.
“You called the police?”
Daniel climbed two more stairs.
“Step away from my children.”
The words came out low.
Sophie flinched anyway.
Daniel saw it.
He stopped immediately.
The reaction hit him harder than anything he had seen on the phone.
Sophie was afraid of raised tension now, not merely Vanessa.
Maybe afraid of him too.
Vanessa shifted Noah higher on her shoulder.
“He’s crying because she doesn’t know how to hold him.”
The officer nearest Daniel said, “Ma’am, I need you to hand the infant to his father.”
Vanessa’s mouth tightened.
“I’m his primary caregiver.”
“No,” Daniel said.
She looked at him sharply.
He climbed the last stair slowly and extended his arms.
Noah came to him without resistance.
Daniel had not held his son for more than ten consecutive minutes in two weeks.
The realization was so ugly that for a second he almost lost track of what the officer was saying.
Noah’s body was hot.
Too light, Daniel thought.
Then he stopped himself.
He did not know whether Noah was too light.
He did not know when Noah had last been weighed.
He should have.
The second officer guided Vanessa several steps away.
Sophie remained beside the nursery door.
Daniel crouched with Noah against his chest.
“Soph.”
She stared at him.
“Come here.”
She did not.
That answer was worse than words.
Daniel stayed where he was.
One of the officers, a woman named Officer Lena Ortiz according to her badge, lowered herself slightly so she was not towering over Sophie.
“Hey, Sophie. I’m Lena. You don’t have to come closer to anybody right now, okay?”
Sophie looked at Vanessa.
Ortiz noticed.
“Could we talk somewhere Vanessa can’t hear us?”
Vanessa laughed once.
It sounded almost normal.
“This is insane.”
The other officer raised a hand.
“Ma’am.”
“I’ve been taking care of those children while he lives at his office.”
Daniel looked at her.
Vanessa stared back.
For the first time since he entered the house, something she said landed exactly where she wanted it to.
Because it was partly true.
The officer moved between them.
“Sir, don’t engage.”
Daniel looked away.
Ortiz asked Sophie whether she would like to speak in the guest room.
Sophie nodded.
She walked behind the officer without touching Daniel.
He stood in the upstairs hallway holding Noah and listened as the guest-room door closed.
Vanessa folded her arms.
“This is what you do?” she said. “You spy on me and call police?”
Daniel said nothing.
“You disappear for fourteen hours a day, but you watch one camera clip and suddenly you’re Father of the Year?”
The male officer’s expression remained neutral.
Daniel looked at Noah.
His son had stopped crying.
Not because he was comfortable.
Because he was tired.
His small fingers curled against Daniel’s tie.
Vanessa continued.
“She lies constantly now. Ask the school. Ask anyone. She’s been impossible since Caroline died.”
Daniel looked up.
Vanessa’s voice softened.
“I was the one here.”
There was something almost pleading in that sentence.
May you like
For months, Daniel had mistaken that quality for devotion.
Vanessa had known Caroline in college. They had stayed loosely connected for years, exchanging birthday messages and Christmas cards. After Caroline died unexpectedly from a postpartum hemorrhage, Vanessa had appeared at the funeral with groceries, diapers, a list of pediatricians, and the uncanny ability to remember where everything belonged.
