Chapter 2 - Two Heartbeats
I reached for the report, but Mara kept one finger on it.
"Read the patient line first," she said.
The name was Rachel Mercer - my first wife, Oliver's mother.
Rachel had died nine years earlier, less than twenty-four hours after giving birth.
For years, I had carried one clean version of that day because it was the only version I could survive: emergency delivery, one healthy baby boy, sudden complications, Rachel gone before sunrise.
The report did not describe one baby.
BABY A: MALE. 6 LB 4 OZ.
BABY B: MALE. 5 LB 11 OZ.
I stared until the letters blurred.
"That's wrong."
"Oliver wasn't a twin."
The next page showed Baby B transferred to neonatal observation at 2:16 a.m.
At 4:02 a.m., a handwritten note said the infant had been moved under an emergency private-care order.
At 5:40 a.m., another document declared him deceased.
There was no doctor's signature.
Only an administrative authorization.
Vanessa Lane was my wife's maiden name.
My knees hit the kitchen chair.
"No."
Mara pulled up Vanessa's background on her phone. "She worked at St. Matthew's Medical Center nine years ago. Patient records department."
I laughed once, but there was nothing funny in it.
Vanessa had told me we first crossed paths at a charity auction five years after Rachel died.
She had looked me in the eyes and said she knew nothing about my past except what friends had told her.
The tablet technician found another file.
This one had no video, only audio.
Vanessa's voice filled the kitchen.
"If Daniel ever asks about the second bracelet, tell him the nurse made a charting error. Grant already fixed the death certificate."
A man answered clearly this time.
"And the child?"
"Gone where he was supposed to go."
I stood so fast the chair fell backward.
"What child?"
Mara's eyes stayed on the report.
"If this is authentic," she said, "Oliver may have a brother."
Footsteps sounded above us.
Oliver appeared on the stairs in dinosaur pajamas, rubbing his eyes.
"Dad?"
I turned the papers facedown.
He looked at the blue folder and went pale.
"She found it," he whispered.
May you like
Mara leaned forward. "Found what, Oliver?"
"The picture of the other baby."
