Chương 6
Elena felt a sudden, ridiculous embarrassment about being barefoot.
She tried to pull the hem of her dress over her feet.
The paramedic noticed and tucked a blanket around them without comment.
Inside the elevator, the mirrored walls showed Elena a woman she did not recognize. Her hair hung loose and tangled. One eye was almost closed. The satin dress she had chosen because it made pregnancy look ceremonial rather than medical was torn, bloodied, and wrinkled above the enormous curve of her stomach.
The young officer stepped in before the doors closed.
“I have the phone,” he said.
A clear evidence bag hung from his hand. Inside were the broken pieces, including the cracked case.
Elena looked at it until the elevator began to descend.
“Thank you,” she said.
The officer nodded.
Her fingers loosened around the brass key still hidden in her palm.
At the hospital, the baby’s heart rate remained stable, but Elena’s contractions did not stop.
A nurse cut away the back of her dress because Elena could not lift her arms without pain. The expensive satin fell into a pale heap beside the bed. Someone placed her pearl earrings and the brass key in a plastic property bag. Someone else photographed her injuries with a hospital camera and asked permission before each image.
The emergency room physician said the eyebrow cut needed stitches. The obstetrician said the contractions might be caused by trauma and dehydration, but they could not assume that was all. Elena was admitted for monitoring.
She answered questions until words became disconnected objects.
Did she lose consciousness?
Possibly.
Had Marcus struck her abdomen?
No.
Had she fallen?
Yes, after he hit her.
Had there been any vaginal bleeding?
No.
Was there someone the hospital should contact?
Elena stared at the blank section of the form.
The nurse waited.
“My sister,” Elena said.
“What’s her name?”
“Lydia Ward.”
Elena corrected herself. “Lydia Moreno.”
The nurse asked for the number.
Elena gave it from memory.
Lydia arrived at four in the morning wearing flannel pajama pants under a wool coat and one of her husband’s sneakers on the wrong foot. The other sneaker was correct. She did not notice until she was beside Elena’s bed.
For several seconds she stood without touching anything.
Elena had seen her sister angry, grieving, exhausted, drunk at a wedding, and terrified during their father’s final week in hospice. She had never seen Lydia’s face become so still.
“Who did this?” Lydia asked.
Elena looked toward the nurse at the station beyond the glass partition.
“Marcus.”
Lydia sat down.
The plastic chair scraped loudly against the floor. She leaned forward with her elbows on her knees and pressed both hands over her mouth.
Elena watched her shoulders rise and fall.
“The baby is okay,” she said.
Lydia nodded without lowering her hands.
“They’re monitoring us.”
Another nod.
“I’m having contractions, but they think they can stop them.”
Lydia dropped her hands. “Why were you there alone?”
The question came too quickly. Lydia heard it after she said it. Her face tightened with shame.
Elena turned toward the window.
The glass showed only their reflections and the fluorescent glow of the room.
“I wasn’t alone,” she said.
“That isn’t what I meant.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry.”
Elena adjusted the blanket over her stomach. “You always ask the practical question first.”
“I’m trying not to ask the other one.”
“What other one?”
“How close did I come to losing you?”
Elena looked at her.
Lydia’s eyes filled, though she blinked the tears back with irritated speed. She reached for the paper cup on the tray, discovered it was empty, and crushed one side with her fingers.
“Don’t do that,” Elena said.
“What?”
“Make me comfort you.”
Lydia placed the cup down.
The words had been crueler than Elena intended, but she lacked the strength to repair them immediately. Their mother had once said that Lydia entered every emergency carrying two buckets: one for the actual fire and one for everyone’s feelings about the fire. Elena had spent years resenting both.
After a minute, Lydia reached into her coat and removed Elena’s reading glasses.
“You left these at my house three weeks ago.”
Elena stared at them.
“I don’t know why I brought them,” Lydia said. “I got the call, and they were on the entry table, so I put them in my pocket.”
Elena took the glasses.
One arm was slightly bent. Lydia’s youngest son had sat on them during Thanksgiving and denied it with such solemnity that no one had managed to stay angry.
Elena set them on the tray.
“Thank you.”
Lydia nodded.
They sat in silence while a cart rattled past in the hallway.
At five twenty, Elena’s attorney called.
Rachel Cho handled professional disputes for conservators, appraisers, and scholars whose work existed in the dangerous borderland between opinion and financial certainty. She had helped Elena negotiate her first independent contract with Vane House and had spent the past year urging her to stop accepting assignments that allowed Marcus final control over documentation.
Rachel did not begin with sympathy.
“Did you send a recording to my portal?”
“Yes.”
“Was it intentional?”
“Yes.”
“Is the recording complete?”
“I don’t know.”
“It begins at eleven forty-three p.m. and ends at eleven fifty-one. There’s a gap of approximately four seconds near the end. I’m preserving the file and its upload logs. I have not listened beyond confirming that voices are present.”
“Listen.”
“I will, after I have a forensic copy. Do you know whether your phone was seized?”
“The police took it.”
“Good. Did you give them your passcode?”
“No.”
“Do not give anyone access until we know what else is on the device.”
Elena closed her eyes.
Rachel continued, “The audio alone will not prove art fraud.”
“I know.”
“It may support coercion and assault. It may also contain statements damaging to you.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
Lydia looked over from the chair.
May you like
Elena turned slightly away.
Rachel said, “Your voice is on the file. You state that the canvas was switched. Marcus states that your signature is on the report. Depending on what happened before the recording began, he may claim you fabricated the accusation after realizing you made an authentication error.”
