Chương 4
They had planned to talk again after the birth.
Then Emily developed severe bleeding.
She remembered the emergency room.
Her mother holding her hand.
A nurse removing jewelry before surgery.
She remembered waking groggy and empty.
Linda crying.
The physician saying there had been complications.
Emily remembered asking to see the baby.
Her mother told her she couldn’t.
Not after what happened.
Emily had been too sedated, too frightened, and too devastated to fight.
Later, there were forms.
Linda handled most of them.
Emily had trusted her mother.
A stupid sentence.
A child’s sentence.
Emily had trusted her mother.
“What happened to my baby?”
Linda shook so badly she had to sit.
“He lived.”
Emily’s breath stopped.
“He was premature. He needed surgery. There were complications, but he lived.”
“And you told me he died.”
“Yes.”
Robert whispered, “Why?”
Linda looked at him with anger suddenly breaking through her fear.
“Because you told me she was ruining her life.”
Robert stepped back.
“I did not tell you to steal her child.”
“No. You told me every day she was making a disaster she’d never recover from. You said Ethan was unreliable. You said she had no money. You said she would end up moving back home and we’d be raising the baby.”
“That does not mean—”
“I know what it means!”
Linda covered her mouth.
Her voice had risen.
They waited.
No movement upstairs.
She continued more quietly.
“I know what I did.”
Emily could not sit.
She began walking toward the kitchen and stopped halfway because she had no reason to go there.
Her body had simply decided to move.
“You gave him to Daniel?”
Linda nodded.
“Daniel and Marissa.”
Emily turned.
“So Marissa was there.”
“Yes.”
“But not his biological mother.”
“No.”
“Who signed the papers?”
Linda looked down.
“What papers?”
“The adoption papers.”
There was no answer.
Emily felt the first clean piece of understanding cut through the shock.
“There wasn’t an adoption.”
Linda whispered, “Not then.”
Robert stared at her.
“What did you do?”
“Marissa had lost a baby two months before. Late miscarriage. She and Daniel were falling apart. Dad knew. I knew. Everybody was trying to fix everybody.”
Emily laughed.
It came out ugly.
“Apparently.”
Linda flinched.
“When your son survived, I panicked.”
“My son.”
“Yes.”
“Say his name.”
Linda looked upstairs.
“Noah.”
Emily turned away.
For eleven years, a boy had carried a name she had never spoken.
Noah.
She put both palms on the kitchen counter.
The room smelled faintly of coffee and wet wool.
There was a bowl of apples near the sink.
One had a brown bruise the size of a thumbprint.
Emily stared at it because it was possible to stare at an apple.
Behind her, Robert said, “How did Daniel become his father legally?”
“He didn’t. Not at first.”
“Linda.”
“Dad found out.”
“When?”
“About three weeks later.”
Arthur.
Emily’s grandfather.
The suitcase.
The records.
“What did Grandpa do?”
“He was furious.”
Linda’s voice softened.
“He wanted to tell you immediately.”
Emily turned.
“And?”
“I begged him not to.”
“Why?”
“Because Daniel had the baby by then. Marissa was taking care of him. You were recovering. You had gone back to Chicago. Ethan was gone. Everything felt…”
She searched for a word.
Emily supplied one.
“Convenient?”
Linda shut her eyes.
“Yes.”
Robert said, “Arthur agreed to this?”
“No. Never.”
Linda looked at the suitcase.
“He started documenting everything because he didn’t trust us.”
“Us?” Emily asked.
“Me. Daniel. Marissa.”
“Dad?”
Linda shook her head.
“Your father didn’t know.”
Robert walked slowly to the mantel and gripped it.
Emily stared at him.
For ten years she had placed him at the center of the betrayal.
He had rejected her.
That remained true.
But the first crime belonged somewhere else.
The distinction did not comfort her.
“What was the eighty-four thousand?” Robert asked again.
“Dad gave it to Daniel to get a lawyer and straighten everything out.”
Emily frowned.
“Straighten it out how?”
“He wanted Noah returned to you.”
“When?”
“When he was about nine months old.”
Emily looked at her mother.
“Nine months.”
Linda nodded.
“You let them keep him nine months after Grandpa knew?”
“I was scared.”
“Of what?”
“Everything.”
“That is not an answer.”
“Of you hating me. Of Daniel going to jail. Of Marissa falling apart. Of Ethan finding out. Of your father finding out.”
Robert let go of the mantel.
“You were afraid I’d find out, so you let me believe Emily stole money from Arthur?”
Linda looked at him.
“That part happened later.”
Emily closed her eyes.
There was more.
Of course there was more.
“Tell it.”
Linda wiped her cheeks.
“Dad threatened to go to the police.”
Emily nodded once.
“So you needed to discredit him.”
“No.”
“Me?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
“Daniel.”
Linda stood.
“He was using pills then. More than we knew. Dad gave him money for an attorney and medical expenses. Daniel used some correctly. He used some for other things.”
“How much?”
“I don’t know.”
“Try.”
“Maybe twenty thousand.”
Robert swore softly.
“Dad found out. He confronted Daniel. They fought. Daniel said if Dad exposed everything, he’d take Noah and disappear.”
Emily felt sick.
“And Grandpa backed down?”
“For a while.”
Robert said, “Arthur Bell did not back down from anybody.”
“No.”
For the first time, Linda almost smiled.
“He didn’t.”
The smile vanished.
“He made copies. Bank statements. Hospital paperwork. Notes from conversations. Anything he could find.”
“The suitcase,” Emily said.
“Yes.”
“And then he died.”
Linda nodded.
Arthur Bell had died from a stroke eleven months after Emily lost the pregnancy she believed had ended in her child’s death.
She had gone to the funeral.
Robert had barely spoken to her.
Daniel had hugged her for a long time.
The memory struck without warning.
Daniel’s arms around her outside the church.
His voice against her hair.
I’m sorry, Em.
She had believed he meant their grandfather.
Her hand flew to her mouth.
May you like
“Daniel hugged me.”
Linda stared at her.
