Chapter 8 - What She Took
The photograph had arrived with a warning.
You’ve upset enough people. Leave the little girl alone.
Daniel had saved it because it frightened him.
He had stayed away because that was exactly what it was meant to do.
Mara asked him to forward the original messages, including the attachments, without altering them.
Then she contacted the detective assigned to our case.
By noon, the story had become larger than a cruel morning in our foyer.
Eleanor had isolated my daughter inside our home and kept Grace’s son outside it.
She had spent years making sure no one compared notes.
While Mara worked, I went back to Beth’s.
Lily was at the kitchen table drawing a house.
Every room had a window.
“Who’s that?” I asked, pointing to a small figure in the yard.
“Aunt Beth.”
“And this one?”
“Me.”
I waited.
She colored the roof blue.
“Where am I?”
Her pencil stopped.
“At work.”
It wasn’t an accusation.
That made it worse.
I sat beside her.
“I’m taking some time off.”
“Because I made trouble?”
“No.”
“Eleanor said you’d lose your job if I kept calling.”
I closed my eyes briefly.
“What happened when you called?”
“She took the phone.”
“How often?”
Lily shrugged.
Children shouldn’t have to count things like that.
That evening, the bank’s fraud investigator called. The withdrawn funds had passed through a joint household account before being transferred to a business I didn’t recognize.
The account records would need further review. My signature complicated matters, but it didn’t end the inquiry.
Mara asked whether Eleanor had handled any other financial paperwork.
I thought about the neat folders she kept beside her laptop.
The errands she volunteered to run.
The business reimbursement forms she offered to scan.
“Too much,” I said.
Then Beth walked into the room carrying Lily’s overnight bag.
She held up a small pink envelope.
“Lily says this is for you.”
Inside was a handmade birthday card dated two months earlier.
I had never seen it.
May you like
On the back, in Eleanor’s handwriting, were four words.
He doesn’t want this.
