Chương 5
“I do.”
“And after Rachel—”
“Don’t.”
Daniel looked at her.
Leah’s expression hardened.
“Do not use my sister-in-law’s death to win an argument I’m not having with you.”
He sat back.
For years, grief had functioned like an all-access pass in the Cole family. He rarely used it deliberately. He had not needed to. People stepped around him before he asked.
Leah did not.
“She made things easier,” he said.
“I know.”
“I thought Emma liked her.”
“Maybe she did.”
“Did you know?”
“That Vanessa was doing this? No.”
“Anything.”
Leah rubbed her thumb over the mug handle.
“Emma stopped asking to come home from my house early.”
Daniel frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“It means nothing by itself.”
“When?”
“Maybe two months ago.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because kids like my house. I have a dog and almost no standards.”
“Leah.”
“I didn’t know.”
Daniel looked at the stairs.
“Anything else?”
She hesitated.
“There was one Saturday. You were in Chicago.”
“April?”
“I don’t know.”
“What happened?”
“Vanessa called and asked if Emma could stay overnight.”
“That’s normal.”
“Yes.”
“But?”
“Emma showed up with two packed bags.”
Daniel stared at her.
“I thought she’d packed too much because she’s a child. Then she asked if she could stay until you came home.”
“When did you tell Vanessa?”
“Tell her what?”
“That Emma asked that.”
“I didn’t. I thought Emma missed you.”
Daniel pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes.
Leah said, “Stop doing that.”
“What?”
“Building the whole case in your head in one night.”
He lowered his hands.
“You just gave me another thing.”
“I gave you one memory. That’s all it is.”
He knew she was right.
It did not help.
His phone vibrated.
Vanessa.
He let it ring.
A text arrived.
Please come home so we can talk privately.
Then another.
Emma should not hear us discussing this.
Then:
I’m asking you not to destroy our marriage over the worst hour of my life.
Daniel read that one twice.
Leah looked at him.
“What?”
He handed her the phone.
She read it.
“Don’t answer angry.”
“I’m not angry.”
“You are extremely angry.”
“I’m not going to yell.”
“Daniel, anger isn’t only yelling.”
He took the phone back.
For a moment he wanted to type exactly what he felt.
You threatened my child and lied to me.
Instead he wrote:
Emma is safe with me. We are not returning tonight. Do not delete or alter anything on the security system. We will speak tomorrow.
He showed Leah.
She nodded.
“Good.”
Vanessa replied immediately.
I would never delete anything.
Daniel looked at Leah.
Neither of them spoke.
He opened the next security clip.
At 4:02, Vanessa returned to the kitchen.
She still wore the gray blouse and cream pants.
She picked up Rachel’s framed photograph.
For several seconds she looked at it.
Then she carried it out of view.
The next clip, fifteen minutes later, showed her bringing in Daniel’s mother’s bowl.
She smashed it.
Daniel watched the clip twice.
The second time he noticed something he had missed.
Before Vanessa picked up the bowl, she looked directly toward the camera.
Not at the lens exactly.
At the doorway.
Then her eyes moved away.
It was possible she had not seen it.
Possible.
At 4:30, she reentered wearing the navy dress and heels she had on when Daniel came home.
Leah leaned closer.
“Why did she change?”
Daniel did not know.
Onscreen, Vanessa arranged the broken pieces in the cardboard box.
Then she called someone.
The microphone captured only her side.
“No, he still thinks I’m exaggerating.”
A pause.
“I know.”
Another pause.
“No, I’m done waiting.”
Daniel glanced at Leah.
The call continued.
“If he sees it himself, maybe he’ll finally understand.”
Vanessa listened.
“No. Not tonight. I said maybe.”
Then:
“I’m not sending her anywhere without him agreeing.”
Daniel stopped the recording.
The kitchen in Leah’s house suddenly felt too warm.
“Sending her where?” Leah asked.
Daniel already knew.
Three weeks earlier, Vanessa had emailed him a brochure for a residential program in Colorado marketed to parents of children with behavioral and emotional problems.
He had opened the link for perhaps thirty seconds.
Then he had called Vanessa from his office.
Emma is not going to boarding school.
Vanessa had said, I didn’t say she was.
He had forgotten the conversation.
Now he remembered her next sentence.
I’m asking you to understand there are options if things get worse.
Daniel stood.
Leah said, “Where are you going?”
“Nowhere.”
He walked to the sink, realized he was carrying his coffee, and poured the untouched cup down the drain.
“You can just leave it,” Leah said.
“I know.”
“You always wash a cup when you’re upset.”
He looked at her.
“What?”
“Mom used to do the same thing.”
He stared at the mug.
A useless family fact.
For some reason it nearly undid him.
He washed the cup.
Upstairs, a floorboard creaked.
Daniel dried his hands.
“I need to talk to Emma.”
“Not tonight.”
“She knows things I need to know.”
“She’s seven, and she just spent an hour being scared in her own kitchen.”
“I’m her father.”
“Exactly.”
Leah’s voice softened.
“Be that tonight.”
He hated advice when it was correct.
He went upstairs.
Emma was awake under the guest-room comforter, still wearing her T-shirt and shorts.
Murphy had managed to squeeze half his body onto the bed.
Emma had one hand on his head.
Daniel sat on the floor beside her.
“You need pajamas?”
“Aunt Leah gave me some.”
“You want to change?”
“Later.”
He nodded.
For a minute neither spoke.
Then Emma asked, “Is Vanessa mad?”
“I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do.”
Daniel almost smiled.
“You’re right. She’s probably upset.”
“At me?”
“No.”
Emma rubbed Murphy’s ear between two fingers.
“She’s going to say it’s my fault.”
Daniel had no prepared language for that.
May you like
“No matter what you said to her today, the things she did were her choices.”
Emma looked at him.
