Chương 8
Emily felt pain settle behind her ribs.
He continued.
“I loved you. I think I loved him. But I was terrified of being responsible for either of you. Daniel wanted the baby. Marissa wanted the baby. Your mom kept saying you were finally getting your life back. She showed me an email you sent her.”
“What email?”
“You said you couldn’t survive going through it again.”
Emily remembered.
She had meant another pregnancy.
Linda had used it to make Ethan believe she wanted distance from Noah.
“I took the money,” he said. “I told myself it was to start over. That if I stayed away, you’d heal. That Daniel would be a better dad than I could.”
“Did you spend it?”
“Most of it.”
“On what?”
“Rent. School. Debt. Nothing noble.”
Emily looked at the lake.
“Did you ever see Noah?”
“Online.”
The answer hurt.
“Did you ever contact him?”
“No.”
“Daniel?”
“Once. After your grandfather died. He told me if I came near them, he’d tell you I sold your son.”
“You did.”
“Yes.”
The absence of defense made it worse.
Emily sat on a damp wooden chair.
“What do you want now?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s not acceptable.”
“I’m not trying to dodge. I genuinely don’t know what I’m allowed to want.”
“You’re allowed to want anything. You’re not allowed to make him pay for it.”
“I agree.”
Emily looked through the kitchen window.
Noah was pouring far too much syrup onto a pancake.
Robert took the bottle away.
Noah stole it back.
The ordinary intimacy was almost unbearable.
“I’m hiring a lawyer.”
“Okay.”
“I may need your DNA results.”
“I have copies.”
“Of course you do.”
“Arthur told me never to throw anything away.”
Emily closed her eyes.
“Send them.”
“I will.”
“And don’t contact Noah.”
“I won’t.”
“Not until I say.”
“Okay.”
She almost hung up.
Ethan said her name.
“What?”
“I’m glad he’s alive.”
Emily looked at Noah through the glass.
“You don’t get credit for that.”
“I know.”
She ended the call.
The lawyer Emily chose was a woman named Rachel Stein who spoke quickly, charged four hundred dollars an hour, and interrupted Emily twice when she began speculating.
“Facts first,” Rachel said.
Emily liked her immediately.
They met by video call Monday afternoon after Emily returned to Chicago.
The suitcase sat on her dining table behind the laptop.
Rachel explained that before anyone made assumptions about custody, adoption, fraud, or criminal exposure, they needed certified records.
“Your family documents are evidence of what people believed or did,” she said. “They are not automatically proof of legal status.”
“What about the hospital records?”
“We verify them.”
“DNA?”
“We verify that too.”
“What about Noah?”
Rachel leaned back.
“What do you want?”
Emily had expected legal questions.
Not that one.
“I want him.”
Rachel’s expression did not change.
Emily immediately hated the sentence.
“No. That’s not right.”
“Take your time.”
“I want to know him.”
“Different.”
“Yes.”
“Do you want him removed from your parents’ home?”
Emily thought of Robert burning popcorn.
Linda cutting Noah’s pancakes because he claimed the knife was “too sharp” while using the same knife herself.
“No.”
“Do you think he is unsafe there?”
Emily hesitated.
“With my mother?”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“No.”
“Good. That matters.”
Rachel tapped a pen against her desk.
“You are dealing with at least two separate things. What was done to you, and what should happen to Noah now. Those answers may not align.”
Emily looked away.
“I know.”
“You may know intellectually. It gets harder when paperwork starts putting numbers next to your loss.”
Rachel was right.
The records came slowly.
The hospital had archived systems.
The original physician had retired.
Some documents required written authorization.
The birth certificate was worse.
Noah had been registered under an amended certificate created after a guardianship process initiated when he was two.
Daniel was listed as father.
Marissa was not listed as mother.
Instead, the maternal section was sealed under court order.
Rachel spent three weeks figuring out why.
During those weeks, Emily spoke with Noah twice.
Both calls were arranged through Robert.
Linda did not participate.
The first lasted six minutes.
Noah showed Emily a model airplane.
The second lasted twenty-three.
He asked why she lived in Chicago.
She said work.
“What do you do?”
“I design training programs.”
“What does that mean?”
“I make adults do homework.”
“That sounds evil.”
“It is.”
He smiled.
She asked about school.
He hated social studies because the teacher assigned group presentations.
He liked science.
He thought geese were “mean for no reason.”
Emily agreed.
After the call, she sat on her couch and cried for fourteen minutes.
Not dramatically.
She checked the microwave clock afterward because the specificity bothered her.
Fourteen minutes.
Then she washed a plate.
Life had always been rude that way.
The sink still had dishes.
At the end of September, Rachel called.
“We found the guardianship file.”
Emily stood in her office conference room.
“And?”
“You need to sit down.”
“I hate when people say that.”
“Fine. Remain aggressively standing.”
Emily sat.
Rachel continued.
“Daniel petitioned for guardianship when Noah was two. The court record includes a statement that the biological mother was deceased.”
Emily stared at the table.
“They declared me dead?”
“In the petition.”
“I was living in Chicago.”
“Yes.”
“Working.”
“Yes.”
“Paying taxes.”
“Yes.”
Rachel paused.
“There is a death certificate attached.”
Emily laughed.
“What?”
“It is not yours.”
Emily stopped.
“The first and last name match. Middle initial does not. Birth date is different by nine months. It belonged to another Emily Carter in Illinois.”
Emily felt cold.
“They used another woman’s death certificate.”
“That appears to be what happened.”
“Daniel?”
“The filing was submitted through an attorney.”
“Which attorney?”
Rachel named him.
Emily recognized it from Arthur’s papers.
“Grandpa paid him.”
“Yes.”
“Did Grandpa know?”
“His letters suggest absolutely not.”
Rachel continued.
“The guardianship was granted based on representations that appear false.”
May you like
“So I can overturn it.”
“Possibly. But Daniel is deceased, and Robert and Linda later obtained guardianship after his death through another proceeding. That proceeding relied on the existing record.”
