Chapter 5
Daniel called me at 8:17 that morning.
I stared at his name on the screen until it almost stopped ringing.
Detective Mason nodded.
“Answer it.”
I put the call on speaker.
“Hello?”
Daniel sounded exhausted.
“Emily.”
“Where are you?”
“Does it matter?”
“Yes.”
“I need to talk to you alone.”
“No.”
“Please.”
“Did you come to Claire’s house?”
“No.”
“Did you leave the photograph?”
Silence.
My stomach tightened.
“What photograph?” he asked.
Mason wrote something in his notebook.
I said, “Sarah.”
Daniel’s breathing changed.
“Who told you that name?”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Emily—”
“She was your sister.”
Silence again.
“You named our daughter after her baby.”
Still nothing.
“Daniel!”
“I wanted something good to come from it.”
“From what?”
His voice cracked.
“You don’t understand.”
“Then tell me.”
“I can’t over the phone.”
“Did you know your mother was giving Lily sedatives?”
A long pause.
“I knew she gave her something once.”
My vision blurred with rage.
“Once?”
“I told her to stop.”
“She didn’t.”
“I know.”
“You knew?”
“Not until recently.”
“When recently?”
“Emily, please.”
“Answer me.”
“Two weeks ago.”
I almost couldn’t speak.
“You knew for two weeks that your mother was drugging our five-year-old daughter, and you didn’t tell me?”
“She said it was melatonin.”
“It wasn’t.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“Why was she drugging her at all?”
Daniel began crying.
Actually crying.
I had seen him cry only twice.
When his father died.
When Lily was born.
“My mother isn’t well.”
“That’s your excuse?”
“No.”
“Then what is?”
“She thinks Lily is Sarah’s child.”
The room went silent.
Even Mason stopped writing.
I whispered, “What?”
“She knows that isn’t rational.”
“She told Lily I stole her.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because Lily told me.”
That hurt almost as much as anything.
Our daughter had asked her father for help.
And he had kept the secret.
“She told you?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Three weeks ago.”
“What did you do?”
“I confronted Mom.”
“And then left Lily alone with her again.”
“I thought I had handled it.”
I laughed in disbelief.
“You thought you handled it.”
“I was afraid.”
“Of your mother?”
“Of everything coming back.”
“What happened to Sarah?”
He didn’t answer.
“Daniel.”
“I was eleven.”
“What happened?”
“I saw her leave.”
My heart pounded.
“You saw her?”
“Yes.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“On August fourteenth?”
Silence.
“How do you know that date?”
I looked at the photograph.
“Someone left me a picture.”
Daniel whispered something I couldn’t hear.
“What?”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Emily, listen to me. Do not trust anyone who contacts you about Sarah.”
“Why?”
“Because there were people involved.”
“What people?”
“I need to see you.”
“No.”
“I’ll meet you somewhere public.”
Mason shook his head.
I ignored him.
“Tell me now.”
Daniel’s voice became desperate.
“My mother didn’t keep Sarah in that basement because she was ashamed she was pregnant.”
I looked at Rachel.
She stared back.
“Then why?”
“Because Sarah wanted to go to the police.”
“About what?”
A long silence.
“My father.”
“What about him?”
Daniel inhaled shakily.
“He was stealing money.”
“From who?”
“The church. His clients. Everyone.”
Robert Hayes had been an accountant.
A respected accountant.
“That has nothing to do with Lily.”
“It has everything to do with what happened.”
“Explain.”
“I can’t.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because if I say it and I’m wrong—”
“You’ve been lying to me for eight years!”
“I was trying to protect you.”
“Don’t ever say that again.”
My voice came out so sharp that Lily looked up from the other room.
I lowered it.
“Where did Sarah go?”
Daniel whispered, “I don’t know.”
“You said you saw her leave.”
“I saw her get into a car.”
“With the baby?”
“Yes.”
“Whose car?”
He didn’t answer.
“Daniel?”
“I have to go.”
“No!”
The call ended.
Mason immediately started making calls.
Rachel sat motionless.
“You said Sarah was afraid Margaret would take the baby,” I said.
“She was.”
“Did she ever mention Robert stealing money?”
“No.”
“You were her best friend.”
“I know.”
“So why wouldn’t she tell you?”
Rachel stared at the floor.
“Maybe she was protecting me.”
I suddenly wondered if I trusted her either.
The anonymous photograph.
Her sudden appearance.
Everything was too convenient.
“How did you find my phone number?”
I asked.
She looked up.
“I told you—”
“No, you didn’t. You said it didn’t matter.”
“It was online.”
“My number isn’t online.”
Rachel’s face changed.
Mason noticed.
“Ms. Cole,” he said, “answer her.”
Rachel rubbed her hands together.
“Someone gave it to me.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know his real name.”
I stood.
“You don’t know?”
“He contacted me two nights ago.”
“What did he say?”
“He said police would be at Margaret’s house soon.”
Mason’s eyes narrowed.
“Before the police were called?”
Rachel nodded.
My skin crawled.
“That’s impossible.”
“He told me if something happened, I should contact you.”
“Who is he?”
“He called himself John.”
“Did he send the photograph?”
“I don’t know.”
Mason asked, “How did he contact you?”
“Email.”
“Show me.”
She pulled out her phone.
Mason took it.
I paced the room.
This wasn’t simply an old family secret.
Someone had known what was about to happen before I came home.
Before I found Margaret forcing pills into Lily.
Unless what happened hadn’t been accidental.
Unless someone had wanted me to see.
My early arrival.
I thought back.
Why had I come home early?
My afternoon meeting had been canceled.
Because of an email.
My boss supposedly had a family emergency.
Except my boss had seemed confused when I texted him afterward.
He had written:
Glad you got the afternoon off. I didn’t send that cancellation, though. HR must have.
At the time, I hadn’t cared.
Now I did.
I opened my phone and found the email.
The address looked corporate at first glance.
But one letter was different.
A perfect spoof.
Someone had deliberately sent me home.
I showed Mason.
His face hardened.
“Someone planned this.”
Rachel whispered, “They wanted you to catch Margaret.”
“Why?”
No one answered.
That afternoon, child services interviewed Lily.
I watched from behind a one-way mirror.
The interviewer was gentle.
She asked Lily to draw the downstairs room.
Lily drew a bed.
A cabinet.
A lamp.
Then a stick figure with long hair.
“Who is that?” the interviewer asked.
“The other Lily.”
My hands went cold.
“Is that the girl in the pictures?”
Lily shook her head.
“No.”
The interviewer kept her voice calm.
“Who is she?”
“She came to see me.”
My knees almost buckled.
“When?”
“When Grandma made me sleepy.”
“Was she real or in a dream?”
Lily thought carefully.
“Real.”
“What did she say?”
“She said I looked like her.”
I pressed my hand to the glass.
The interviewer asked, “How old was she?”
Lily shrugged.
“Big.”
“Like your mommy?”
“No. Like a teenager.”
My heart slammed.
“Did Grandma see her?”
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
“Grandma cried.”
The interviewer leaned forward.
“Do you know the girl’s name?”
Lily nodded.
“What was it?”
My daughter answered in a tiny voice.
“Lily.”
Rachel made a choking sound beside me.
I turned.
Her face was white.
“Sarah’s baby would be twenty-seven now,” she whispered.
I stared through the glass.
“What are you saying?”
Rachel’s eyes filled with tears.
“I’m saying maybe she didn’t die.”
That evening, Mason received preliminary results from fingerprints collected in the basement.
Most belonged to Margaret.
Some belonged to Daniel.
Some belonged to Lily.
But one unidentified set belonged to an adult woman.
And according to the forensic technician, those prints were fresh.
Less than a week old.
Someone had been inside the hidden room recently.
Someone Lily claimed was a grown version of Sarah’s baby.
Then Mason’s phone rang.
He listened.
His face changed.
“What?” I asked.
He ended the call.
“We found Daniel.”
“Where?”
“His car is parked near the old Union Station.”
“And Daniel?”
“Gone.”
My pulse raced.
May you like
Mason continued.
“But there’s blood in the driver’s seat.”
