Chương 3
Despite herself, Mara asked, “What did he say?”
“I don’t speak Italian.”
“You’ve worked here six years.”
“I know menu Italian. He wasn’t ordering fish.”
A bus hissed to a stop at the corner. Mara walked toward it.
Rosa caught her sleeve. “He didn’t hurt Ellie.”
“I know.”
“He held her like—” Rosa stopped.
“Like what?”
“Like he’d done it before.”
Mara looked back at Aurelia. Through the glass, she could see Dominic standing at the edge of the dining room in his cream uniform, speaking quietly to Colin. People watched him without appearing to. Even from the sidewalk, his presence altered the shape of the room.
Dominic lifted his head.
For one second, their eyes met through the rain-streaked doors.
Then the bus arrived, blocking him from view.
Mara’s apartment was in a narrow brick building in Queens where the radiators clanged after midnight and the kitchen window faced another wall. She carried Ellie up three flights because the elevator had been broken since June. The hallway smelled of fried onions and someone’s lavender detergent. A bicycle was chained to the banister despite four printed notices forbidding it.
Inside, Mara locked both deadbolts and set Ellie in the crib.
Only then did the baby wake.
Her eyes opened slowly. She looked at Mara with mild surprise, as if the evening had been peaceful and Mara’s face was the confusing part. Then she smiled.
Mara sat on the floor.
Ellie kicked beneath the blanket. One sock had slipped halfway off. Mara fixed it, then covered her mouth with both hands.
She did not cry dramatically. There was no collapse, no sound fit for a movie. Her shoulders moved twice. Her breath caught. She lowered her forehead to the crib rail and stayed there until Ellie reached through the slats and caught a strand of hair that had fallen loose from Mara’s bun.
“Ow,” Mara whispered.
Ellie pulled harder.
“Okay. Message received.”
The baby released her hair and made a soft bubbling sound.
Mara changed her diaper, warmed a bottle, and sat in the old wooden chair Owen had found on the curb and repaired during the first month of her pregnancy. One armrest remained lighter than the other because he had run out of stain. Mara used to complain about it. After his death, she had threatened a moving company employee who suggested leaving the chair behind.
Ellie drank with her eyes half closed.
Mara’s phone showed twelve missed calls. Four were from Rosa. Three from Colin. One from a number she did not recognize. Two were from Owen’s mother, Diane. The final call had come from Aurelia’s main line.
A message waited from Colin.
Please contact me before tomorrow’s shift. Your employment remains active.
Another appeared from the unknown number.
This is Leah Rosen, counsel for Moretti Hospitality. Mr. Moretti has asked me to confirm that no adverse action will be taken against you. We also need to discuss the incident involving Mr. Sorrelli.
Mara deleted neither message.
She laid the phone facedown and watched Ellie finish the bottle.
At one thirty, after the baby finally slept, Mara emptied the diaper bag on the kitchen table. Two bottles. Three diapers. A packet of wipes. A pale-blue hat. A receipt from the pharmacy. A tiny plastic giraffe. The yellow rattle from Dominic’s office.
Mara froze.
She had not put it there.
The rattle was old, heavier than modern baby toys, with a faded cream handle and small golden stars beneath the clear plastic dome. She turned it over. On the handle, nearly worn smooth, were the letters A.M.
She almost called the restaurant.
Instead she placed the rattle on the counter and covered it with a dish towel.
At eight the next morning, someone knocked on her door.
Mara had been awake for twenty minutes, though she had slept less than three hours. Ellie lay on a blanket in the living room, chewing the ear of the plastic giraffe. The knock came again, firm but not violent.
“Ms. Sullivan?” a woman called. “My name is Tasha Bell. I’m with Child and Family Services.”
The room narrowed.
Mara checked the peephole. A Black woman in a navy coat stood beside a younger man holding a tablet. Both displayed identification through the glass.
Ellie slapped the giraffe against the floor.
“Just a minute,” Mara said.
Her voice sounded normal. That felt like betrayal.
She lifted Ellie, scanned the room, and saw every flaw at once. The laundry on the sofa. The unopened utility bill. A bowl in the sink. The patch of peeling paint near the radiator. She shoved the laundry into the bedroom, then stopped. Hiding it would look worse. She brought it back and dropped it on the sofa exactly where it had been.
When she opened the door, Tasha Bell gave her a tired, careful smile.
“I know this is alarming,” Tasha said. “We received a report concerning an infant left unattended in a commercial storage area.”
“From who?”
“The report was anonymous.”
“It was my former manager.”
“I can’t confirm the source.”
“He locked her in there.”
The younger man glanced at Tasha.
Tasha’s expression did not change. “May we come in?”
Mara wanted to refuse. She knew enough about power to recognize when refusal would be treated as evidence. She stepped aside.
Tasha entered without looking around theatrically. She removed her wet shoes near the mat after noticing Mara was barefoot. The younger man did the same.
“This is my colleague, Aaron Price,” she said. “We’d like to talk with you, see where Ellie sleeps, and make sure there are no immediate safety concerns.”
“There aren’t.”
“I hope not.”
The answer was neither kind nor cruel. That frightened Mara too.
She sat with Ellie on the couch. Tasha took the chair opposite her and opened a folder.
May you like
“Can you tell me what happened last night?”
Mara began with the sitter quitting. She explained the waiting list at the subsidized daycare, the deposit she could not afford at the private center, Diane’s arthritis flare, the evening shifts she could not miss. She described asking Victor for four days off and being told the restaurant could replace her before dessert service.
