Chương 5
In truth he had stayed at a bar with a development partner because he was angry at Richard.
Sarah watched his face.
“You remember.”
“Yes.”
“The collapse happened at twelve seventeen.”
Daniel stared at the floor.
Sarah went on.
“A maintenance worker found me six hours later in a service void. I had a crushed pelvis and internal bleeding. Mercer security got to me before city rescue did.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“It did that day. Your father had private emergency crews on-site because the property was opening the next month.”
“Who took you out?”
“Two men. One was named Wade. I never learned the other one’s name.”
“Where did they take you?”
“St. Vincent’s private surgical center.”
Claire frowned.
“That place closed.”
“Three years ago.”
Daniel looked up.
“You were alive in a hospital while I was searching for you?”
Sarah nodded.
He stood and walked three steps away.
His breath shook once.
He pressed his fist against his mouth.
Sarah said nothing.
Claire did not touch him.
After a while Daniel turned back.
“Why was there a body in the coffin?”
Sarah’s face changed.
“A body?”
“My father says there was.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“You thought it was empty?”
“I thought there was no funeral.”
Daniel laughed softly in disbelief.
“There were two hundred people.”
Sarah sat down.
For the first time since she had entered the hallway, she looked frightened.
“I didn’t know.”
Daniel saw it clearly.
Whatever else she had done, whatever she had accepted, this part was new.
Claire asked, “Was another person missing from the collapse?”
Sarah looked at her.
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“Three fatalities were confirmed. One maintenance contractor was never found.”
Daniel felt sick.
Claire took out her phone.
“What was his name?”
Sarah closed her eyes.
“I don’t remember.”
“Don’t guess.”
“I’m not.”
Claire searched news archives.
Daniel looked at her.
“What are you doing?”
“Finding out who you buried.”
Sarah flinched.
Claire noticed.
“Sorry.”
“No. Do it.”
A few minutes later, Claire found an old local article.
Four names appeared beneath a photograph of the collapsed garage.
Three dead.
One missing.
MATEO RUIZ, 42.
Electrical subcontractor.
Married.
Two children.
Body never recovered.
Daniel sat down again.
“I buried Mateo Ruiz.”
“No,” Claire said. “We don’t know that yet.”
“My father said there was a body.”
“We verify.”
“How?”
“A court order, probably.”
Sarah looked at Daniel.
“His family spent five years without a grave.”
Nobody spoke.
A nurse opened Lily’s door.
“Ms. Keene?”
Sarah stood immediately.
“She’s awake.”
Lily appeared behind the nurse, rubbing one eye.
She saw Daniel.
Stopped.
Then looked at Sarah.
“Can he come in?”
Sarah’s shoulders tensed.
Daniel did not move.
Lily looked at him again.
“Mom said you’re my dad.”
Sarah closed her eyes.
Not because Lily had done anything wrong.
Because children did not respect dramatic timing.
Daniel’s throat closed.
He crouched several feet away.
“That’s what she told me too.”
Lily considered that.
“You didn’t know?”
“No.”
“Why?”
Daniel looked at Sarah.
Sarah’s face gave him nothing.
He chose the only safe truth.
“Because the grown-ups made some bad decisions.”
Sarah’s mouth tightened slightly.
Lily frowned.
“Mom made bad decisions?”
“Yes,” Sarah said before Daniel could answer. “I did.”
Daniel looked at her.
Lily absorbed this.
Then she asked Daniel, “Did you?”
He almost laughed.
“Yes.”
“A lot?”
Claire covered her mouth.
Sarah looked away.
Daniel nodded.
“More than I should have.”
Lily stepped into the hall.
She was wearing hospital socks.
One had little blue grips on the bottom.
“You look different from the picture.”
Daniel stopped.
“What picture?”
Lily glanced at Sarah.
Sarah hesitated.
Then she reached beneath the collar of her scrub top and unclasped the necklace.
The pendant was not a pendant.
It was a small locket.
She opened it.
Inside was a photograph no larger than a thumbnail.
Daniel, twenty-nine, laughing into the sun.
He remembered the day.
Lake Michigan.
Sarah had taken the picture from the passenger seat of a rented boat.
He looked at her.
“You kept that?”
Sarah closed the locket.
“It belonged to me.”
Lily pointed.
“That’s my dad picture.”
Daniel pressed his lips together.
“Yeah.”
Lily studied his face.
“You’re older.”
Claire laughed before she could stop herself.
Even Sarah smiled.
Daniel rubbed the back of his neck.
“That happens.”
“How old are you?”
“Thirty-five.”
Lily looked horrified.
“That’s a lot.”
“It feels like it today.”
Sarah’s smile vanished as quickly as it had come, but the moment changed something.
Not trust.
Not forgiveness.
Only the temperature of the room.
A police detective arrived twenty minutes later.
Her name was Mara Chen.
She was in her forties, compact, tired-looking, and unimpressed by the Mercer surname.
“I need Ms. Keene first,” she said.
Daniel stood.
“I’m involved.”
“I’m sure you are.”
“I want to be present.”
“No.”
Sarah surprised him.
“He can stay.”
Chen looked at her.
“You’re certain?”
“Yes.”
Claire moved toward the door.
“I’ll leave.”
Sarah looked at her.
“You can stay too.”
Claire raised an eyebrow.
“You sure?”
“No.”
Claire almost smiled.
They remained.
Chen placed a recorder on the rolling tray beside Lily’s uneaten applesauce.
Lily had been taken down the hall with a pediatric nurse.
Sarah watched the doorway until she was gone.
Then she talked.
She told Chen about the original collapse, the hospital, Richard’s offer, Arizona, and Lily.
She described the agreement she had signed.
“Do you still have it?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“With an attorney.”
Daniel looked at her.
“You had a lawyer?”
“Eventually.”
Richard had made Sarah sign the original agreement while she was still recovering. She had not been represented then. Two years later, after moving to Colorado and finding steady work, she had shown the papers to an attorney named Naomi Feld.
Feld had told her the agreement was likely unenforceable in several respects and possibly evidence of coercion.
“Why didn’t you come forward then?” Chen asked.
May you like
Sarah looked at Daniel.
“Because by then his father had sent me photographs of Lily leaving preschool.”
