Chapter 4 - The Test I Never Requested
The hospital confirmed that the bracelet came from a private prenatal consultation I remembered attending. I had believed it was a routine screening covered by Daniel's employer. The invoice, however, listed a foundation associated with Sterling Legal Services.
Mara obtained a warrant for the relevant records. The tests themselves were ordinary. The suspicious part was an additional genetic comparison ordered without my informed consent. The laboratory had received a sample attributed to my unborn child and a reference sample labeled only M-04.
"Was Daniel trying to find out whether he was the father?" I whispered.
The physician explained that the paperwork didn't establish that, and the sample trail was questionable. I refused to let a stolen test define my marriage or my daughter.
Vincent sat across from me in the hospital conference room. "Richard collected information on people he could control," he said. "This could be about leverage, not parentage."
Then Mara called. The orchard had been abandoned for two years, but its caretaker had identified the girl in Daniel's photograph. She'd once stayed there with a woman named Nora Vale. They had left suddenly after men in a dark SUV began asking questions.
Nora's name meant something to Vincent. She had been Elena's closest friend in nursing school, a woman he had tried to contact after Elena vanished. Richard had told him she moved overseas.
"Another lie," Vincent said.
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That night I dreamed Daniel was standing on the far side of a locked glass door. He kept pointing behind me. When I woke, my phone contained a voicemail from an unknown caller. A child's voice said, "Aunt Nora says the rabbit remembers the way home."
Then the call ended.
