Chương 5
“She has a father who may be alive.”
“A father who abandoned her mother.”
“We don’t know why.”
“Leah knew.”
“What did she say?”
“That Daniel loved people most when they were helping him escape something.”
Ethan leaned back.
It sounded like Daniel. Not the whole of him, but enough.
“Did she want him to have custody?”
“No.”
“Did she put that in writing?”
“Maya has it.”
“Then we call Maya too.”
“Tonight?”
“Tonight.”
“It’s after business hours.”
“People answer when a dead man comes back.”
“You’d be surprised.”
Claire laid Nora in the portable crib. The baby stretched beneath the blanket, then settled with both hands near her face.
Ethan watched until her breathing became regular.
He called Major Bell from the dining room.
The major answered on the fourth ring.
“Cole. You home?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How’s Claire?”
Ethan looked through the doorway. Claire stood beside the crib, listening without pretending otherwise.
“I need to report contact involving my brother.”
There was a pause.
“Your brother is deceased.”
“That may be incorrect.”
Major Bell did not ask whether Ethan had been drinking. Ethan appreciated that.
“Explain.”
Ethan gave only what he could state without depending on Claire’s account: an identifiable personal item, a claimed sighting six months earlier, a phone call the previous day, a woman connected to Daniel who had recently died, and a child whose father might be Daniel.
The major interrupted twice to clarify dates.
When Ethan finished, Bell said, “Do not contact the individual.”
“I don’t have a number.”
“Do not attempt to find one. Preserve the tag. Don’t clean it, bag it in plastic, or handle it more than necessary.”
“I already handled it.”
“Then stop.”
Claire found a paper lunch bag in the pantry. Ethan placed the tag inside and folded the top.
Bell told him a criminal investigator would call. He also told Ethan not to leave the house unless necessary.
“Am I confined?”
“No. I’m advising you not to complicate an already complicated situation.”
“Sir, my wife may be in danger.”
“I heard you.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the answer I can give before I know whether the man is your brother, an impostor, or someone exploiting your family.”
“He knew private information.”
“So do people who research targets. Lock your doors.”
The call ended.
Claire stood with her arms folded.
“You trust them?”
“I trust that the call now exists in a record.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“It’s what I have.”
She looked toward the crib.
Ethan found Maya Chen’s number on the card. A recorded message instructed callers to leave details for emergencies involving child safety.
Claire left the message.
She did not mention Daniel by name until the end.
When she finished, Ethan asked, “Why did you say Nora was with us?”
“Because she is.”
“You said us like we agreed.”
Claire placed the phone on the table. “Do you want me to say she’s with me and a man who arrived forty minutes ago?”
“I live here.”
“You haven’t lived here for seven months.”
“I didn’t choose that.”
“Neither did I.”
The response came too quickly. Claire looked away.
Ethan felt anger rise, familiar and almost welcome because it required less courage than grief.
“You chose not to tell me our child died.”
“Yes.”
“You chose to bring a fugitive into our house.”
“Yes.”
“You chose to hide his girlfriend.”
“Yes.”
“You chose to take responsibility for their baby.”
“Yes.”
“Without me.”
“You were not here.”
“I was still your husband.”
“You were a face on a screen that froze every time I started to cry.”
“That is not my fault.”
“I didn’t say it was.”
“You keep saying things like they happened around you.”
Claire pressed her fingertips against her forehead.
“I know what I did.”
“Do you?”
“I lied by not saying it. Then I kept lying because each day made the first lie worse. I let you talk about cribs. I let your mother mail blankets. I moved the ultrasound picture every time I wanted to throw it away, and then I put it back because I couldn’t stand the empty spot.”
Her breath caught, but she continued.
“I helped Leah because she was pregnant and frightened and because when I looked at her, I saw the body I was supposed to have. I hated her for that. Then I hated myself. Then she needed somewhere to sleep, and hating her didn’t change it.”
Ethan said nothing.
“She was not easy,” Claire went on. “She lied about stupid things. She hid crackers in the bedroom. She accused me of reading her messages when I didn’t even know the name on her phone account. She took my car twice without asking. She also sat on the bathroom floor with me when I couldn’t stop bleeding and cleaned the grout after I fell asleep.”
Claire’s voice lowered.
“I was angry at you for not being here, which was unfair. I was angry at the baby for dying, which was insane. I was angry at Leah’s baby for living. Then Nora was born and none of that mattered for about three hours. After that, all of it mattered again.”
Ethan’s anger did not leave. It changed shape.
He looked at the framed ultrasound.
“Where did you put the hospital bracelet?”
Claire’s eyes moved to the drawer beneath the television.
He opened it.
Inside lay batteries, instruction manuals, a roll of tape, two takeout menus, and a clear plastic bag containing a small white bracelet printed with Claire’s name and a date from six months earlier.
Beside it was another bag containing something folded in pale blue cloth.
Ethan did not touch either.
“I wanted to tell you in person,” Claire said.
“Which version?”
“The true one.”
He closed the drawer.
May you like
At seven fourteen, an investigator named Special Agent Rina Delgado called. Her voice was calm and unsympathetic, which Ethan preferred.
She asked him to photograph the tag without removing it from the paper bag. She requested screenshots of every call and message from unknown numbers on both phones. Claire admitted she had deleted the blocked call.
