Chapter 10: Ruth's Questions
Ruth Sinclair had been asking questions for eight months.
Terrence learned this sitting across from her in the hospital cafeteria at 9:30 a.m., while Charlotte ate toast at the table beside them and Delilah slept upstairs with a nurse present.
Ruth was seventy-one.
She had been a school administrator for thirty years before she retired.
She had the posture of someone who had spent decades in rooms where she was the person responsible for what happened next.
"I noticed it at Christmas," she said.
"Delilah was quiet.
Not shy-quiet — she's never been shy.
Wrong-quiet.
Like she was listening for something.
And she kept pressing her hand against her stomach."
"Did you say anything to Douglas?" Terrence asked.
"I said something to Douglas at Christmas, at New Year's, and twice in February.
Each time he had an explanation.
She was tired.
She was adjusting to a new school schedule.
She had a mild stomach sensitivity.
He said it the way he says everything — like the conversation was already over before it started."
"When did you call the pediatrician?"
"March.
I called Dr.
Osei's office and left a message with the receptionist.
I said I was the girls' grandmother, I had concerns about Delilah's health, and I wanted to speak with someone.
I left my number." Ruth set her coffee cup down.
"Two days later I got the letter from Douglas's attorney."
"Did you keep the letter?"
She opened her handbag and placed an envelope on the table.
Terrence looked at it without touching it.
"May I?"
She nodded.
He read it carefully.
The letter was from Preston Hale's firm.
It stated that Ruth Sinclair had made unsolicited contact with a minor's medical provider, that this constituted interference with parental medical authority, and that any further contact of this nature would result in legal action.
It was signed by Preston Hale.
"He had the letter ready in two days," Terrence said.
"He was watching for it," Ruth said.
"He knew I'd called."
"Someone at the pediatrician's office told him."
Ruth looked at her hands.
"I've been thinking about that.
Dr.
Osei has been their doctor since they were born.
I don't believe she would have told him.
But someone in that office did."
Charlotte had been eating her toast quietly.
She looked up now.
"Daddy knows the lady at the front desk," she said.
"He always talks to her when we go in.
He brings her coffee sometimes."
Terrence and Ruth looked at each other.
"What's her name?" Terrence asked.
Charlotte thought about it.
"He calls her Patty."
Terrence wrote it down.
"Mrs.
Sinclair," he said, "I need to ask you something directly.
In the time you've known your son — has he ever done anything like this before?
To anyone?"
Ruth was quiet for a long moment.
"His wife," she said finally.
"The girls' mother.
Her name is Vivienne.
She left three years ago.
She took nothing with her — no clothes, no money, no car.
She just left.
Douglas said she had a breakdown.
Said she'd been unstable for years." Ruth looked at the table.
"I never believed him.
But I had no proof.
And she never contacted me after she left.
I've always thought that was strange.
Vivienne loved those girls."
"Do you have any way to reach her?"
"I've tried.
The number I had stopped working a year after she left." Ruth looked up.
"But her sister lives in Portland.
Her name is Cora Vance.
I have her number.
I've had it for three years and I didn't know what to do with it."
She opened her handbag again and placed a folded piece of paper on the table beside the attorney's letter.
Two pieces of paper.
Both of them had been carried in a handbag for months, waiting for the right moment.
Terrence thought about Charlotte's list of dates, hidden in a hoodie pocket.
The women in this family, he thought, had been keeping records.
All of them.
In the only ways available to them.
"May I take this?" he asked.
May you like
"Please," Ruth said.
"Please find out what happened to Vivienne."
