Chapter 2 - THE PHONE THAT SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN THERE
Lenora's confidence vanished, then returned with a smile.
"Elise asked me to hold her phone."
"She left it charging on the kitchen counter," I said.
Daniel unlocked the screen because he knew Elise's passcode. The conversation was only four messages long, all sent within the last hour.
I can't keep doing this.
He won't stop crying.
I got him alone.
The next part starts tonight.
The replies from the unknown number were worse.
Stay calm. Follow the plan. Do not call Daniel.
"Where is Elise?"
I told him she had gone to pick up a prescription and groceries. She should have been back twenty minutes earlier.
Lenora gave a soft laugh. "Maybe she finally ran."
Daniel stepped toward her. "You stole her phone."
"Careful," Lenora said. "You don't know what that woman has been hiding from you."
The front door opened again.
Elise walked in carrying a pharmacy bag and stopped when she saw the broken vase, my bleeding lip, her mother-in-law against the wall, and Daniel holding Owen.
"What happened?"
Daniel held up her phone. "Mom says you used a donor because I can't have children."
Elise looked at Lenora, not Daniel.
"How do you know that?"
Elise crossed the room and took the phone. Her thumb moved quickly through the messages.
"I didn't send these."
"I know," Daniel said.
"Do you?" Her voice sharpened. "Because you asked me about the donor before you asked why your mother had our baby in a washing machine."
Daniel flinched.
Lenora moved toward the door. "Ask her who signed the clinic forms."
Elise's eyes narrowed.
"What clinic forms?"
Lenora stopped.
Then red and blue lights flashed across the front windows.
Two police cruisers pulled into the driveway.
May you like
Lenora smiled again.
"Those forms," she said, "are about to matter a lot."
