Chapter 4: The Page I Never Wrote
I hadn't spoken about my sister in eight months.
Not because I'd forgotten her.
Because every time I tried, my husband found a reason to leave the room, and the conversation died before it started.
After a while, I stopped trying.
Detective Reyes set the folder on the tray table beside my hospital bed and opened it to the back.
Behind my prenatal records — behind the ultrasound printouts and the iron supplement notes and the blood type confirmation — was a single folded page that did not belong there.
It was a letter.
Handwritten.
Dated eleven months ago.
My sister's handwriting.
"Do you recognize this?" Detective Reyes asked.
I recognized it before she finished the question.
Mara's letters always slanted left, like she was writing into a wind only she could feel.
"Where did this come from?"
"It was inside the folder when we logged it into evidence.
Can you tell me what your relationship with your sister is?"
"Was," I said.
"She d—" The word stopped.
"She passed away.
Eight months ago.
They told me it was an accident."
Detective Reyes didn't write anything down.
She watched me.
"They," she said.
"Who told you?"
"My husband.
He took the call.
He said she'd fallen on the stairs at her apartment.
That by the time anyone found her, it was already—" I stopped again.
"Did you speak to anyone else about it?
Police?
Her building manager?
Anyone?"
"He handled everything.
The arrangements.
The calls.
He said I was too upset to deal with it.
That I needed to let him manage it." I looked at the letter.
"I never saw a report.
I never spoke to anyone who knew her."
Detective Reyes turned the letter so I could read it.
Nora, it began.
I know you won't get this the way I'm sending it.
He checks everything.
So I'm going to put it somewhere he won't think to look, and I'm going to trust that you find it when you need it.
I found out what he did with the account.
The joint account you told me about — the one he said was for the baby.
It isn't.
I have the statements.
I have copies.
They're with my neighbor, Mrs.
Aldrich, in a blue envelope.
If something happens to me before I can get to you, go to Mrs.
Aldrich.
Tell her Mara sent you.
My hands were shaking.
The paper shook with them.
"She knew," I said.
"It looks like she was trying to reach you."
"He told me she was confused.
That she'd been struggling.
That she'd started making things up about people she didn't like." I set the letter down because I couldn't hold it steady anymore.
"He said she'd been saying things about him.
That it was jealousy.
That I shouldn't let it upset me."
Detective Reyes picked up the letter carefully.
"Nora, I need to ask you directly.
Do you have any reason to believe your sister's d—her passing — may not have been an accident?"
The monitor beside my bed beeped steadily.
The baby moved once, low and slow.
"I didn't," I said.
"Until right now."
Detective Reyes closed the folder.
"I'm going to need Mrs.
Aldrich's address if you have it.
And I'm going to need you to tell me everything you remember about the eight days before your sister died."
I told her I didn't know Mrs.
Aldrich's address.
I had never been to Mara's apartment without my husband driving.
Detective Reyes nodded and stood.
"We'll find her," she said.
"Rest.
Someone will be outside your door tonight."
She was almost at the door when I said it.
"He told me Mara left a note.
That she'd written it herself.
That it explained everything."
Detective Reyes turned back.
"Did you ever see that note?"
"No," I said.
"He said it was too painful.
That I should trust him and let it go."
She looked at me for a long moment.
"We never found a note," she said.
"There was no note in the original report."
The door closed behind her.
May you like
And the room was very quiet, and the monitor kept beeping, and I lay there understanding that my husband had not only taken two days of my life and buried me in the dirt.
He had taken my sister.
