Chapter 3
The wristband was small enough to disappear in Maya’s palm.
She turned it over.
Her thumb traced the faded ink.
“Patient: Maren Ellis,” she read. “Infant: Baby Girl Ellis.”
Maya looked up.
“That’s my name.”
Claire reached for the wristband.
Maya pulled it back.
“Don’t.”
“Give it to me.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s private.”
“Private?” Maya said. “It has my name on it.”
I looked at Claire.
“What is this?”
“An old hospital band.”
“From the day Maya was born?”
She said nothing.
Maya opened one of the letters. It was sealed, yellow at the edges, addressed to her in Maren’s handwriting.
“Don’t,” Claire said again.
The word landed like an order.
Maya’s face hardened.
“You can’t keep telling me not to look at things you hide.”
She unfolded the letter.
Her eyes moved across the page.
Then stopped.
She read the first line out loud.
“My dearest Maya, if you are reading this, something happened before I could tell you myself.”
The room changed.
I felt the past open under my feet.
Maren had died when Maya was twelve. We had thought we knew everything about her life. We had gone through her belongings, her files, the small box she kept on the closet shelf.
I had never seen this letter.
Maya kept reading.
“I need you to know that you were wanted from the first moment. You were loved before I ever held you. Nothing that comes next can change that.”
Her voice shook.
She stopped.
Claire crossed the room.
“Let me explain.”
“Explain what?” I asked.
Maya looked at the paper again.
“There’s a name written here. Eleanor Vale.”
Claire’s hand froze in the air.
“Who is Eleanor?” I asked.
Claire sat down.
For the first time all day, she looked afraid in a way that had nothing to do with the bank.
“She was Maren’s older sister.”
I turned sharply.
“Maren didn’t have a sister.”
“She did.”
“Why did she never tell me?”
“Because they had a falling out.”
“What does that have to do with Maya?”
Claire’s lips pressed together.
Maya looked at the wristband.
“Why does it say somebody else’s baby?”
Nobody answered.
I took the wristband from her carefully and examined it. The print was worn, but one line was clear:
INFANT: VALE, FEMALE.
My fingers went numb.
Maya’s hand reached for it again.
“I was born in that hospital,” she said. “I know my birthday. I know my name.”
“I know,” I said.
“Then why does it say Vale?”
Claire drew a breath.
“Maren had a baby before you.”
“What?”
“It was stillborn.”
Maya stumbled back as though Claire had shoved her.
“Why would you tell me that like it’s nothing?”
“It was a long time ago.”
“It’s my mother’s baby.”
“It was before you.”
“That’s not the point.”
Maya’s anger gave way to confusion. She looked at me, searching for something steady.
I had nothing to give her.
“What did Maren write?” I asked.
Maya looked at the letter.
The next lines had been under a crease. She smoothed the paper against the table.
“Eleanor wanted to name her Hope. I wanted to name her Rose. We agreed on neither because we never got to bring her home.”
Claire’s eyes closed.
Maya looked at the wristband again.
“The baby’s last name was Vale.”
“Eleanor’s husband was named Vale,” Claire said. “The hospital paperwork was filed under his name.”
“You said Maren’s baby was stillborn,” I said. “Then how did the hospital wristband end up saying Vale?”
“Because Eleanor delivered in the same hospital.”
Maya stared at her.
“You’re saying Mom’s sister had a baby too?”
Claire swallowed.
“I’m saying the records were complicated.”
“What records?” I asked.
She rose and reached for her phone.
I moved between her and the table.
“Not one more thing leaves this room without us knowing.”
Claire let out a short laugh.
“You think you can control all of this?”
“No. But I can stop you from hiding it.”
Maya kept reading.
A paragraph lower on the page had been written in a different pen.
“If Eleanor ever comes back, listen to her. She knows what happened. I was too afraid to tell you.”
Maya looked up.
“Afraid of what?”
The doorbell rang.
All three of us turned.
Claire went pale.
I went to the front door and looked through the window.
A woman stood on the porch. She was in her late fifties, with gray streaks in her dark hair and a raincoat pulled tight around her.
I opened the door but kept the chain on.
“Can I help you?”
She looked past me.
“Maya Ellis?”
“Who are you?”
“My name is Eleanor Vale.”
Behind me, Claire whispered, “No.”
The woman’s gaze moved to the box on the table. She saw the bracelet.
Her expression broke.
“You found Maren’s things,” she said.
Maya appeared beside me.
“Do you know my mother?”
Eleanor’s eyes filled.
“I was her sister.”
“Mom didn’t have a sister.”
“I know what you were told.”
Claire rushed to the doorway.
“You need to leave.”
Eleanor didn’t look at her.
“Claire moved the money, didn’t she?”
The question froze the room.
I stepped outside and closed the door behind me.
“What do you know about the money?”
“Not here.”
“I’m asking you now.”
She looked at the house.
“Claire was supposed to keep you away from me. That was the arrangement.”
“What arrangement?”
“The one she made after Maren died.”
I stared at her.
“You knew my wife was gone?”
“I knew she was dying. I called. Claire answered. She told me Maren didn’t want to see me.”
“She said Maren wanted no contact?”
“Yes.”
“Did you believe her?”
“I did for a while.”
“Why come now?”
“Because somebody called me two nights ago and said the money was gone.”
“Who?”
“Someone who knows the account. Someone who knew Maren.”
Eleanor took a folded envelope from her coat.
“I have the original papers from the hospital.”
“Why?”
“Because the baby who died was not Maren’s.”
A terrible silence settled between us.
I looked through the window.
Maya stood behind it, clutching her mother’s letter.
“Then whose baby was it?” I asked.
May you like
Eleanor pressed the envelope into my hand.
“Mine.”
