Chương 4
“I asked him to witness the handoff.”
“The handoff,” Claire repeated.
Ethan looked at her as if he wished he could take the words back.
Noah began crying harder.
Claire turned away from them, moving toward the quieter end of the kitchen.
She bounced him slowly and whispered against his hair.
“I’ve got you. I’ve got you.”
It was what she always told him.
After vaccinations.
During thunderstorms.
When he woke disoriented from naps.
Tonight the phrase felt like a promise she might have to prove.
Behind her, Margaret said, “Do not let those people into this house.”
Ethan gave a humorless laugh.
“You don’t give orders here.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Not anymore.”
Margaret held his gaze.
“That depends on what you’ve done.”
The doorbell rang a third time.
Then Ethan’s phone vibrated.
He glanced at it.
Claire saw the name before he turned the screen away.
PETER.
Margaret saw it too.
“Answer him,” she said.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m trying to deal with you.”
“You were willing to send an infant out of the country with that man five minutes ago. Now you’re afraid to answer his call in front of us.”
“I am not afraid.”
“Good. Answer.”
Ethan’s voice dropped.
“Stop talking to me like I’m fifteen.”
Margaret’s expression did not change.
“Stop behaving like you need supervision.”
Claire would have noticed, on any other night, how precisely that sentence hurt him.
Ethan’s face tightened before he looked away.
There was history there.
Years of it.
But Noah’s crying had become hungry now, and hunger did not care about history.
Claire looked toward the small bottle warmer near the sink.
“I need to feed him.”
Ethan turned immediately.
“I can do it.”
“No.”
“Claire.”
“No.”
He froze.
It might have been the first time she had ever refused him without explaining why.
She crossed to the refrigerator, keeping Noah between her and Ethan, and opened the door.
Three prepared bottles sat on the middle shelf.
Only two should have been there.
Claire stopped.
Her eyes moved to Ethan.
“Why are there three?”
He did not answer.
The third bottle had a strip of masking tape around it.
NOAH — 8 PM.
Written in black marker.
Not Claire’s handwriting.
The nurse outside had been inside her house.
Maybe earlier that day.
Maybe while Claire had been upstairs.
A sickness moved through her stomach.
“You brought her here already.”
Ethan’s silence confirmed it.
“When?”
“She came by this afternoon.”
“I was here.”
“You were sleeping.”
Claire stared at him.
Noah’s cries sharpened.
She pulled out one of the bottles she had prepared herself and shut the refrigerator.
“You let a stranger into the house while I was asleep.”
“She’s a pediatric nurse.”
“You let her pack my child’s things.”
“She needed to know what he uses.”
“You took my passport.”
“I needed it for the paperwork.”
“You forged my signature.”
Ethan looked away.
That was enough.
The kitchen became very still.
Even Margaret did not speak.
Claire’s fingers began shaking around the bottle.
She set it on the counter before she dropped it.
For the first time that night, Ethan looked ashamed.
Not sorry.
Ashamed.
There was a difference.
A sorry person moved toward the harm.
An ashamed person wanted the harm hidden.
“Did you sign my name?” Claire asked.
“No.”
“Did you tell someone to?”
“No.”
“Then who did?”
“I don’t know.”
Margaret made a soft, disbelieving sound.
Ethan turned on her.
“I didn’t.”
“Yet you used the document.”
“I was told it was handled.”
Claire closed her eyes.
There it was again.
Handled.
Somewhere beyond the front door, strangers were waiting to take her baby.
Her husband had stolen her passport.
A document existed with her forged signature.
And Ethan was still speaking as if the problem were poor administration.
Noah cried against her chest.
Claire picked up the bottle, checked the temperature against her wrist, and sat in one of the counter stools.
She positioned Noah carefully and gave him the nipple.
He latched immediately.
The room quieted except for his small swallowing sounds.
Ethan watched.
His shoulders lowered.
Margaret looked from him to Claire.
Nobody spoke for nearly a minute.
The ordinary act of feeding a baby rearranged the room.
Claire had learned in the first weeks after Noah’s birth that adults became strangely respectful around a feeding infant. They lowered their voices. They moved more slowly. Even arguments waited.
She used that minute.
She looked at the passport wallet in Margaret’s hand.
“Open the form.”
Margaret did.
“Read it to me.”
“Claire,” Ethan said.
She did not look at him.
“Read it.”
Margaret unfolded a printed document.
Her eyes moved down the page.
“It authorizes Noah James Bennett to travel internationally from Florida to the Bahamas under the supervision of a designated caregiver.”
“Named?”
Margaret read.
“Rebecca Elaine Moore.”
“The woman outside?”
“I assume so.”
Claire looked at Ethan.
“What else?”
Margaret hesitated.
Claire saw it.
“What?”
“There’s a date range.”
“How long?”
Margaret looked at her.
“Thirty days.”
Claire stopped breathing.
Ethan spoke quickly.
“That was administrative. It doesn’t mean he’d be gone thirty days.”
“How long would he be gone?”
“A week.”
“You said a few days.”
“A week is a few days.”
“No, it isn’t.”
“Claire, I hadn’t decided.”
“You hadn’t decided how long to keep my baby in another country?”
“Our baby.”
The correction was automatic.
Possessive.
Claire looked at him.
“Yes. Our baby. Which is why you needed my permission.”
His mouth opened.
Nothing came out.
Margaret continued reading silently.
Then she stopped.
“What?” Claire asked.
Margaret folded the page once.
“What?”
“There’s a second document.”
Ethan crossed the space between them.
“Mom, that has nothing to do with tonight.”
Margaret stepped backward.
“What is it?” Claire asked.
Ethan reached for the papers.
Margaret pulled them away.
“Don’t.”
“Give me the file.”
“Ethan.”
“It’s confidential.”
Claire laughed then.
One short sound.
No humor in it.
“My passport is in your confidential file.”
May you like
He looked at her.
Noah kept drinking.
