Chương 1
"""The birthday gift left Daniel Mercer’s hand before he understood why his fingers had opened.
It struck the marble floor just inside the front door with a flat, expensive little crack, crushing one corner of the silver paper. Daniel barely looked down. His black suitcase rolled another six inches behind him and tipped against his leg while he stared across the foyer at the pale-blue school backpack sitting among white lilies.
A black ribbon had been tied around one shoulder strap.
He knew the backpack. He had complained about replacing it in September because Ava’s old one had been perfectly usable, and Ava had informed him with the seriousness of a corporate attorney that third grade required a different number of pockets. She had chosen the blue one because it was, according to her, “the exact color of Saturday mornings.”
Now it sat beneath a framed photograph of her.
Candles trembled around the frame.
Daniel’s mouth went dry.
“Why is my daughter’s backpack wearing a mourning ribbon?”
Behind him, Vanessa Cole stopped so suddenly that the wheels of her suitcase bumped her ankle. She made a small sound—not quite a gasp—and covered her mouth.
Rebecca stood beyond the flower-covered table near the entrance to the living room. She wore a long black dress Daniel had never seen. Her auburn hair had been pushed behind one ear without care. She looked smaller than she had six days earlier, but that was not what frightened him.
It was her face.
There was no surprise in it.
No relief that he was home.
Only exhaustion.
“Because her funeral was yesterday,” she said.
Daniel stared at her.
He heard the faint hiss of one candle. Somewhere deeper in the house, something electronic gave a short burst of static and went quiet.
“No.”
Rebecca did not move.
Daniel looked at the photograph again.
Ava was smiling in it, her long light-brown hair lifted slightly by wind, pale-blue dress wrinkled at the waist. The photograph had been taken the previous spring at her cousin’s wedding. Ava had complained that the shoes pinched and then danced barefoot for two hours.
Beside the picture stood a silver urn.
His mind rejected the object before it rejected the words.
He took one step toward the table.
Rebecca said, “Don’t.”
He stopped.
The wrapped gift lay at his feet.
Vanessa whispered, “Daniel.”
He turned on her with such force that she flinched.
“I spoke to her three nights ago.”
He heard his own breathing now. Too shallow. Too fast. His jaw ached from clenching it.
Rebecca’s eyes moved briefly to Vanessa and then returned to him.
“No, Daniel.”
A tear gathered along Rebecca’s lower lashes. She blinked once. It stayed there.
“You spoke to someone using her phone.”
The burst of static came again.
Daniel turned toward the hallway.
Two uniformed detectives stepped into view first. They had been standing back near the study, deliberately out of sight from the front door. A third man followed them, mid-fifties perhaps, charcoal suit, tired face, thin evidence folder tucked beneath one arm.
The man looked at Daniel, then at Vanessa.
“I’m Detective Michael Hale,” he said. “Greenwich Police.”
Daniel’s eyes went to the folder.
Hale raised it slightly.
“And we know who sent those messages.”
For several seconds nobody spoke.
Then Daniel looked at Vanessa.
Color drained from her face so quickly that even in his confusion he noticed it. Her hand dropped from her mouth. She took one involuntary step backward.
Rebecca saw it too.
Hale’s voice remained calm.
“Ms. Cole, don’t leave.”
Vanessa looked toward the open front door.
One of the uniformed detectives moved just enough to stand between her and it.
“What?” Vanessa said. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Her voice was controlled, but Daniel had known her for four years and had slept beside her for eleven months. He knew the tiny signs. The flattening of her vowels when she was frightened. The way her right thumb pressed into the side of her index finger. The faint lift of her shoulders as if she were preparing for cold.
He had mistaken those things for competence once.
Now he did not know what anything meant.
He looked back at Rebecca.
“When?”
She understood the question.
“Thursday.”
It was Monday morning.
Daniel’s knees weakened, and he put one hand against the edge of the entry table.
Thursday.
He had been in London on Thursday.
Thursday night Vanessa had ordered room service because rain had canceled the dinner their hosts arranged. She had eaten half his fries while sitting cross-legged on the sofa in his hotel suite, still wearing the pearl earrings he had given her in Boston.
At 10:14 that night, Ava had texted him.
Daddy, Mom says you’re probably asleep but I wanted to say goodnight.
He had answered from bed while Vanessa was in the bathroom.
Not asleep. Miss you, bug.
Miss you too. Don’t forget Saturday.
I won’t.
Promise?
Promise.
Saturday was Ava’s ninth birthday.
The gift on the floor contained the watercolor set she had asked for.
Daniel bent suddenly, hands on his thighs.
Nothing came up.
He stayed there, staring at the white veining in the marble.
Someone touched his shoulder.
He jerked away.
Vanessa withdrew her hand.
“Don’t touch me.”
“Daniel, I—”
“Not one word.”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
Hale gave them several seconds before speaking.
“Mr. Mercer, I know this is not how anyone should receive this information.”
Daniel straightened.
“Then how should I receive it?”
The anger arrived cleanly. He welcomed it because it was easier than the silver urn.
“How should a father find out his child is dead? At the airport? In the car? Before his girlfriend walks him into the memorial?”
Rebecca looked at him.
The word hung there.
Girlfriend.
Daniel had intended to deal with that word differently.
Not like this.
Never like this.
He saw something change in Rebecca’s face. Not shock. That would have been easier. Recognition, maybe. Confirmation.
May you like
“You knew,” he said.
Rebecca gave a tired laugh with no humor in it.
