Chapter 5
Daniel dropped to his knees in front of Emily.
“Yes.”
She looked frightened.
“But Aunt Rebecca said—”
“I don’t care what any test says.”
His voice broke.
“I’m your dad.”
Emily stared at him.
Then wrapped her arms around his neck.
Daniel started crying.
I looked away because watching them hurt too much.
Biology suddenly felt both enormously important and completely meaningless.
Detective Morales ordered DNA testing for Daniel, Emily, Noah, and me.
The results would take time.
Rebecca arrived at the hospital that afternoon.
Daniel met her in the hallway.
“You knew I was infertile?”
Rebecca cried immediately.
“I was fifteen.”
“You knew for twenty years.”
“Mom told me you had an infection as a teenager. She said doctors told her you would probably never father children.”
Daniel rubbed both hands over his face.
“And when Sophie got pregnant with Emily?”
“Mom said it proved the doctor was wrong.”
“But she knew that wasn’t true.”
Rebecca nodded.
“Probably.”
I stepped forward.
“What was the blue folder?”
Rebecca looked at me.
“Mom kept it locked in Dad’s old office.”
Daniel frowned.
“Our father’s office?”
Their father, Peter Carter, had died three years before I met Daniel.
Rebecca nodded.
“I found it when I was seventeen.”
“What was inside?”
“Medical records. Fertility records. Adoption documents.”
I felt cold.
“Whose adoption documents?”
Rebecca looked toward Emily.
Daniel noticed.
His voice became dangerous.
“Rebecca.”
She whispered, “A baby girl.”
Emily.
My knees almost gave way.
“No.”
Rebecca grabbed my hand.
“I don’t know if it was Emily. I only saw the file for a few seconds before Mom caught me.”
“What name?”
“There wasn’t one. It said Baby Carter.”
Daniel looked sick.
“When was it dated?”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
“Eight years ago.”
The year Emily was born.
I stared at my daughter through the hospital window.
She was coloring beside Noah’s bassinet.
My mind returned to her birth.
A difficult labor.
Emergency sedation.
I woke hours later.
Linda was holding Emily.
She told me there had been complications.
I had never questioned why I couldn’t remember seeing my baby immediately after delivery.
Detective Morales understood what I was thinking.
“Where was Emily born?”
“St. Vincent.”
The detective’s face hardened.
The same hospital where Hale had worked.
Daniel leaned against the wall.
“No.”
I whispered, “What if they switched her?”
He looked at me.
“Don’t say that.”
“What if the baby I delivered was taken?”
“Sophie.”
“And Emily was given to us instead?”
Rebecca covered her mouth.
Detective Morales spoke carefully.
“We need DNA before drawing conclusions.”
But I already knew.
Linda hadn’t started this scheme with Noah.
She had done it before.
My phone buzzed.
An unknown number had sent me a photograph.
A newborn girl in a hospital bassinet.
The date was eight years earlier.
Written across the bottom:
SOPHIE CARTER’S BIOLOGICAL DAUGHTER.
My chest tightened.
Another message appeared.
SHE DIDN’T DIE.
I stared at the screen.
Daniel read it over my shoulder.
May you like
Then the third message arrived.
LINDA KNOWS WHERE SHE IS.
