Chapter 8: The Things They Said When They Thought It Was Over
Daniel came to the hospital.
He couldn't get past the front desk — the protective order had already been flagged in the system — but he stood in the lobby for twenty minutes, and a security officer came to tell me, and asked if I wanted to know what he had said.
I said yes.
"He said he was worried about you," the officer told me.
"He said you'd been having episodes.
He said his mother was very concerned."
"What did you tell him?"
"I told him he needed to leave the premises." The officer — his badge said T.
WARREN, which struck me as almost funny given everything — looked at me carefully.
"He didn't leave right away."
"No," I said.
"He wouldn't."
T.
Warren left.
Grace came back in.
"He called my office," she said, sitting down.
"Forty minutes ago.
He wanted to know who had retained me."
"What did you say?"
"My assistant told him we don't discuss client relationships." She set a new folder on the bed.
"He then called Renata.
She didn't pick up.
He left a voicemail." Grace opened her phone and pressed play.
Daniel's voice filled the small room.
*"I don't know what she's told you, but she has a history.
Ask her about the breakdown before the wedding.
Ask her about the medication she stopped taking.
Whatever she's shown you, whatever she's recorded — she edits things.
She takes things out of context.
My mother has done nothing but try to help her through a very difficult pregnancy and this is how—"*
Grace stopped the recording.
I looked at the ceiling.
"He's been preparing that version for a while," I said.
"Yes," Grace said.
"Which is why the recordings matter so much.
There's no editing a voice saying 'the agency already has a family lined up.'" She paused.
"Patricia called too.
Different tone."
"What did she say?"
Grace looked at her phone again.
"She said, and I'm reading directly: 'My son loves that girl.
Whatever she thinks happened, it was all for her own good.
She was not coping.
Someone had to make the hard decisions.'"
I thought about the tube.
The feed bag.
The livestream comments from strangers.
"For my own good," I said.
"That's what she said."
I looked at Grace.
"Is that what she'll say in court?"
"Almost certainly."
"Good," I said.
"I want her to say it in court."
Grace studied me for a moment.
Then she wrote something in her folder.
"There's one more thing," she said.
"Warren Gill gave a statement this morning.
He's cooperating.
He named Patricia as the one who initiated contact.
He said she came to him eight months ago — before you were even pregnant — with a plan."
The room felt very still.
"Eight months ago," I said.
"Yes."
"Before I was pregnant."
"Yes."
I put my hand on my stomach.
My daughter turned — that slow roll again, unhurried, unaware.
"She planned it before I was even carrying her," I said.
Grace didn't answer.
She didn't need to.
Outside, the morning had gone fully bright.
I could see it at the edges of the blinds — real light, the kind that doesn't ask permission.
"What happens to Patricia?" I said.
"That depends on what the DA decides to do with Gill's statement and your recordings." Grace closed her folder.
"But I'll tell you this — she said 'when that baby comes' on a livestream that was screenshotted by four hundred people.
That's not something you walk back."
I nodded slowly.
"Rest today," Grace said.
"Statement tomorrow.
After that, we build the case."
She stood to leave.
"Grace," I said.
She turned.
"Thank you for believing Donna."
Grace looked at me for a moment.
"Donna believed you first," she said.
"I just did the paperwork."
May you like
She left.
I lay back against the pillow and closed my eyes, and for the first time in ten weeks, I didn't listen for footsteps.
