Chapter 4
Something was wrong.
I brought the photo toward the overhead light.
Then I saw it.
On the far left edge of the picture, barely visible, was part of another hospital bassinet.
And a second baby.
My mouth went dry.
“Damien.”
He stepped closer.
“Look.”
His eyes narrowed.
Neither of us spoke.
I searched inside the envelope again.
There was a second sheet of paper stuck beneath the photograph.
It was a photocopy of a hospital discharge form.
Patient: Isabella Bennett.
Date: March 21.
Newborn discharge count:
Two.
My knees nearly gave way.
“That has to be a mistake.”
Damien took the page but didn't touch anything else.
“It could be.”
“I don't have a sibling.”
“I don't know.”
“Mom would have told me.”
But even as I said it, all the lies of the evening gathered around that sentence.
Her father.
Damien.
The sealed birth record.
The clinic.
Elena.
What else had she never told me?
At the bottom of the form, someone had circled the number two.
Beside it was a handwritten note.
One child released to mother.
Second placement authorized under separate record.
I felt suddenly cold.
“Placement?”
Damien reread the sentence.
“This might explain why the original file was sealed.”
“What are you saying?”
“I don't know enough to say anything yet.”
“Was I adopted?”
“There is no evidence of that.”
“Then what does second placement mean?”
He didn't answer.
My phone rang.
The sound echoed through the storage unit.
Mom.
I stared at the screen.
Damien stepped back.
“Answer.”
I did.
“Mom?”
There was a pause.
Then her tired voice.
“Ava, where are you?”
I looked at the open boxes.
“At your apartment.”
The lie came automatically.
Maybe I had learned that from her.
She was quiet.
“Ava.”
“Yes?”
“Did you open the wooden box?”
My heart stopped.
“How did you know?”
“I know you.”
I closed my eyes.
“Mom, who is Elena?”
Silence.
Not confusion.
Recognition.
“Ava.”
“Who is she?”
“Come to the hospital.”
“Tell me now.”
“I can't do this on the phone.”
“Were there two babies?”
The line became so quiet that I thought the call had disconnected.
Then I heard Mom take a breath.
“You found the storage unit.”
My eyes opened.
Damien was watching me.
“You knew it was still here?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I kept paying for it.”
I looked at Damien.
He heard.
His expression changed.
“Mom, the discharge paper says two newborns.”
“I know.”
“Was I adopted?”
“No.”
“Then who was the second baby?”
Mom didn't answer.
“Please.”
Her voice trembled.
“Ava, there are things I should have told you years ago.”
“Then tell me now.”
“I was afraid.”
“Of Richard?”
A sharp inhale.
“Who told you about Richard?”
“Damien.”
Another silence.
Then Mom said, “He's with you.”
It wasn't a question.
I looked at him.
“Yes.”
Her next words came quietly.
“Put me on speaker.”
I did.
Damien moved closer.
“Isabella.”
Twenty-seven years disappeared inside the way he said her name.
Mom didn't answer him directly.
Instead, she spoke to me.
“Ava, I need you to listen carefully.”
“I'm listening.”
“The papers in that unit don't tell the whole story.”
“What whole story?”
“The second baby wasn't mine.”
I stared at the discharge sheet.
“What?”
“But I took responsibility for her.”
“Her?”
Damien went still.
My mother continued.
“For three days.”
“Whose baby was she?”
Another silence.
Then Mom whispered, “Elena's.”
I looked at the photograph.
Elena holding me.
The second bassinet.
“What happened to her?”
“I don't know.”
“How can you not know?”
“Because someone took her from the hospital before Elena could leave.”
My stomach dropped.
“Who?”
“That is why I left Damien.”
Damien moved toward the phone.
“Isabella, what are you saying?”
“I found papers in your father's office.”
“What papers?”
“An agreement.”
“Between whom?”
“Your father and Richard.”
Damien's face changed.
“What agreement?”
Mom started coughing.
The sound was deep and painful.
“Mom?”
“I am all right.”
“You don't sound all right.”
“Listen to me.”
I gripped the phone.
“I found evidence they were arranging private adoptions through the clinic.”
Damien went pale.
“That's impossible.”
“I wanted to believe that too.”
“My father funded the clinic.”
“I know.”
“Isabella—”
“I copied everything.”
Damien stared at the boxes around us.
“Is that why you disappeared?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you come to me?”
“Because your father's signature was on every page.”
Damien said nothing.
Mom's voice softened.
“I didn't know if I could trust you.”
Something painful crossed his face.
“You could have.”
“I know that now.”
The words hung between them.
Twenty-seven years too late.
I looked at the discharge form again.
“Mom, what does this have to do with me?”
“You were born at Saint Anne's. Elena gave birth at the clinic the same morning.”
“Then why are we on the same discharge sheet?”
“Because the clinic moved several patients to Saint Anne's after a power failure.”
“And Elena's baby disappeared?”
“Yes.”
“Was she kidnapped?”
“We never knew.”
“Where is Elena now?”
Mom became quiet again.
“Ava.”
“What?”
“Elena died twenty-four years ago.”
I stared at the photograph in my hand.
“That can't be true.”
“What do you mean?”
“I saw her this week.”
Mom inhaled.
Slowly.
“What did you say?”
“The woman in this photograph. She was at your hospital.”
“No.”
“She spoke to me.”
“No, Ava.”
“Damien has security footage.”
Damien took the phone.
“Isabella, Ava identified her.”
Mom's voice changed completely.
Not louder.
More frightened.
“Show me.”
I sent the security still.
Seconds passed.
Then a sound came through the phone.
Not a gasp.
Almost a whisper.
“That isn't Elena.”
I looked at Damien.
“Then who is she?”
Mom didn't answer.
“Mom?”
When she finally spoke, her voice was barely audible.
“That is Elena's daughter.”
The storage unit seemed to disappear around me.
I looked again at the woman in the photograph.
Late fifties.
Impossible.
“Elena's daughter would be my age.”
“Yes.”
“That woman isn't twenty-seven.”
“I know.”
“Then how can she be her daughter?”
My mother whispered something I almost didn't hear.
“She isn't the baby who disappeared.”
A chill moved slowly through me.
“What?”
“Elena had another daughter.”
“Older?”
“Yes.”
“How much older?”
“Thirty-one years.”
Damien's eyes sharpened.
“What was her name?”
Mom hesitated.
Then said, “Claire.”
The name meant nothing to me.
Until Damien turned toward the open suitcase.
Something had caught his attention.
He crossed the unit and knelt.
Inside the suitcase lid was a stitched fabric pocket.
He opened it.
A small white envelope fell out.
His name was written across the front.
Damien.
His hands shook for the first time that night.
He opened it.
Inside was a single photograph.
He stared at it.
Then sat down heavily on the nearest box.
“What?” I asked.
He didn't answer.
I took the photograph from his hand.
My mother stood outside the clinic.
Elena stood beside her.
A younger woman stood between them.
Dark hair.
Rectangular glasses.
Claire.
On the back, someone had written:
Claire Moretti.
Damien's sister.
I looked up slowly.
“Your sister?”
Damien's face had lost all color.
“No.”
“But it says—”
“I have one sister.”
“Lucia?”
“Yes.”
“Could your father have had another daughter?”
He stared at the photograph.
“I don't know.”
My mother's voice came through the phone.
“Damien?”
He picked it up.
“Isabella.”
“You found the picture.”
It was obvious she already knew.
His voice was quieter than I had ever heard it.
“Who is Claire Moretti?”
My mother didn't answer immediately.
Then she said the words that changed every question we had been asking.
“Claire wasn't your father's daughter.”
Damien closed his eyes.
“Then why did she use my family name?”
“Because twenty-seven years ago, she married someone who did.”
He opened his eyes.
“Who?”
Mom's voice shook.
“Your brother.”
Damien stared at the phone.
“I don't have a brother.”
“That,” my mother whispered, “is what your father wanted everyone to believe.”
Claire stood between my mother and Elena outside the old clinic, younger then, smiling faintly at whoever had taken the picture.
On the back, in faded handwriting:
Claire Moretti.
Damien’s sister.
Except she wasn’t his sister.
She had married his brother.
A brother Damien insisted had never existed.
“What was his name?” Damien asked.
My mother exhaled slowly.
“Gabriel.”
Something changed in Damien’s face.
It happened so quickly I almost missed it.
His eyes moved away from the photograph.
“Gabriel,” he repeated.
“You’ve heard the name,” I said.
He didn’t answer.
My mother did.
“Of course he has.”
Damien turned toward the phone.
May you like
“No.”
“Yes.”
