Chương 6
“Were you going to?”
“No.”
The answer came quickly enough to sting.
Then he added, “But I hadn’t filed yet. I kept delaying. I told her I needed time.”
Kirsten looked at the drawer full of menus from restaurants that had closed years ago.
“Why did you humiliate me yesterday?”
Connor did not answer.
“Was it for her?”
“No.”
“For the people watching?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
His breath moved unevenly against the microphone. “Because you looked at me like I had become exactly what you expected.”
“I didn’t look at you at all.”
“I know.”
The honesty left no surface for anger to strike.
“I wanted you to be hurt,” he said. “For a second. I wanted to know I could still—”
“Still what?”
“Reach you.”
Kirsten stood too quickly and steadied herself against the counter.
“You brought a child into my workplace and used him as a weapon because being ignored offended you.”
“Yes.”
His voice cracked on the single syllable.
She wanted him to defend himself. She wanted the familiar arrogance back so she could push against it.
Instead he said, “I’m sorry.”
“No, you’re frightened.”
“I can be both.”
She ended the call.
The genetic testing took place four days later in a private office chosen by the court-appointed child advocate, a family-law attorney named Simone Ellis. Simone wore bright green glasses and spoke in a voice that made adults lower theirs to hear her.
The baby’s name was Caleb.
Kirsten had known that from photographs, but hearing Melinda say it in the room felt different. Names belonged to the people who used them at two in the morning, to the people who knew whether a child preferred bananas sliced or mashed.
Caleb sat on Melinda’s lap and attempted to eat the paper wrapper from a sterile swab.
“No, sir,” Simone told him, gently taking it away. “Evidence is not a snack.”
Caleb studied her green glasses, then reached for them.
Connor stood across the room with his attorney, Martin Shaw, a broad man who wore suspenders and looked perpetually inconvenienced. Dana remained near Melinda. Kenneth stood beside Kirsten but said almost nothing.
The technician explained the cheek swabs.
Kirsten listened with the attention she gave residents explaining procedures they had practiced all week. She knew how genetic comparisons worked. She knew what the result would probably say. Still, when the swab touched the inside of her mouth, her hands began to shake.
She put them in the pockets of her coat.
Melinda noticed.
Their eyes met for the first time since the hospital.
“You still do that,” Melinda said.
“What?”
“Hide your hands.”
Dana touched her arm. “Melinda.”
“I’m not discussing the case.”
Kirsten removed her hands from her pockets. “You don’t know what this is.”
Melinda looked at Caleb. “I know.”
Connor took a step forward. Martin stopped him with one hand.
The technician swabbed Caleb last. He protested with a brief, offended cry, then accepted a cracker from Simone. Everyone watched him chew.
Kirsten hated them for watching.
“He isn’t a result,” she said.
No one answered.
Afterward, in the parking garage, Melinda called her name.
Kirsten kept walking.
“Kirsten, please.”
She stopped beside her car.
Melinda approached alone. Dana stood thirty feet away with Caleb, deliberately close enough to intervene and far enough not to hear every word.
The garage smelled of wet concrete and exhaust. A fluorescent tube buzzed overhead.
Melinda wrapped both arms around herself. Without Caleb, she looked smaller.
“I didn’t know they would tell you it was destroyed,” she said.
Kirsten stared at her.
“I thought they would say it had been donated.”
“That would have been better?”
“No. I’m trying to explain.”
“Then explain.”
Melinda looked toward Dana, who gave no signal.
“I found out the clinic had marked your file inactive after the settlement review. I knew the embryo was still there because Lisa told me.”
“Lisa Moreno?”
“She was angry at Dr. Vale. She said the alarm story was false. There had been a labeling error in another tank, and he used your embryo loss to hide the audit problem.”
Kirsten heard each sentence clearly but could not fit them together.
“Why would she tell you?”
“Because I kept calling. You couldn’t get out of bed. Connor was never home. I thought if I understood what happened, I could help you.”
“You were sleeping with my husband.”
Melinda flinched. “Not yet.”
Kirsten laughed once. It sounded ugly in the concrete space.
“You want credit for the calendar?”
“I’m telling you when I learned.”
“What did you do?”
Melinda pressed her lips together.
Kirsten took one step closer. “What did you do with my embryo?”
“I was afraid he would leave.”
The answer was so nakedly selfish that Kirsten could not speak.
Melinda continued quickly. “Connor was angry all the time. At you, at himself, at the clinic. He would come to my apartment and talk for hours, then go home. He said he wanted children and that the chance was gone. He said your marriage had become a hospital room.”
“So you gave him a baby.”
“I thought—”
“No. Do not hide inside that phrase.”
Melinda’s eyes filled. “I thought if I could give him the family he wanted, he would choose me completely.”
“And Lisa helped you?”
“She introduced me to Vale.”
“Why would he do it?”
“He needed money.”
“The payment came from you?”
“My mother’s trust.”
“You used a company.”
“Vale told me to.”
“Did you forge my signature?”
Melinda looked down.
The buzzing light seemed to grow louder.
“Did you forge my name?”
“I copied it.”
Kirsten leaned against the car because her knees had weakened.
Melinda stepped forward. “I never meant to hurt Caleb.”
“Do not say his name to make this sound maternal.”
“I am his mother.”
The words came fast, instinctive.
Kirsten looked at her.
May you like
Melinda’s face changed as she understood what she had said.
“I carried him,” she whispered. “I was sick for twenty-one weeks. I bled at thirty-two. I slept sitting up because he kicked when I lay on my left side. I know which song makes him stop crying in the car. I know he rubs the giraffe’s ear when he’s tired. You can hate me. You should. But do not tell me I used his name.”
