Chapter 4: The Calls She Made
The hospital was a twenty-minute drive from the motel.
Ethan drove.
I sat in the back with Lena, Noah pressed against his mother's side with his head on her shoulder.
She kept her hand in his hair the whole way, her eyes half-open, fighting the heaviness that the remaining sedative still pulled through her.
"Stay awake," I told her twice.
"I'm awake," she said both times, and almost meant it.
At the ER, a nurse took one look at Lena and moved fast.
Within ten minutes she was on a bed behind a curtain, an IV line in her arm, a doctor asking questions about what she had taken and when.
Ethan answered most of them.
His voice stayed even.
His hands did not.
I took Noah to the waiting area and found him a cup of juice from a vending machine.
He drank it in four swallows and set the cup on the seat beside him.
"Is she going to be okay?" he asked.
"Yes," I said.
"She is."
He nodded once, like he was filing it away for later when he could actually feel it.
My phone rang.
Diane again.
I stepped away from Noah and answered.
"She went home," Diane said.
"I had my cousin follow her — I hope that's okay, I just had a feeling — Margaret went straight to her house in Highland Park.
She was on the phone the entire drive.
My cousin said she looked — " Diane paused.
"He said she looked like someone running a campaign."
"A campaign."
"His word.
Like she was organizing something."
I thought about that.
"Did he see who came or went?"
"One car arrived about fifteen minutes after she did.
He didn't get the plates but said it was a man, maybe sixty, in a suit."
A lawyer.
Almost certainly a lawyer.
"Thank you, Diane."
"Claire." Her voice dropped.
"Are you okay?
You walked out of your own wedding in a dress and nobody has heard from you in three hours."
"I'm okay."
"That's not an answer."
"I know." I looked through the waiting room window at Noah, who had found a frayed magazine and was staring at it without reading.
"I'll call you later."
I hung up and went back inside.
Ethan came out from behind the curtain twenty minutes later.
He sat down next to me and put his face in his hands for a moment.
Just a moment.
"She's stable," he said.
"They're running a full panel.
The doctor said the sedative concentration was — " He stopped.
"He said it was higher than a normal prescribed dose."
The words landed carefully between us.
"She wasn't trying to help Lena sleep," I said.
"No." He lifted his head.
"She was trying to keep her from functioning."
Noah had put the magazine down.
He was listening, but he didn't ask questions.
He already understood more than a seven-year-old should have needed to.
Ethan looked at his son for a long moment.
Then he reached over and put a hand on the back of the boy's neck, gently, the way you steady something you're afraid of losing.
"I'm sorry," Ethan said.
"I didn't know you existed.
I want you to know that."
Noah looked up at him.
"Mom said you didn't."
"She was right."
"She said it wasn't your fault."
Ethan's throat moved.
"She was right about that too."
My phone buzzed again.
Not Diane this time.
A number I didn't recognize.
Dallas area code.
I answered.
"Is this Claire Ashworth?" A man's voice.
Measured.
Professional.
"Yes."
"My name is Richard Hale.
I'm an attorney.
I've been asked to reach out to you and to Ethan Cole regarding a matter of — " A brief pause.
"— mutual interest."
My stomach tightened.
"Who asked you to call?"
Another pause.
Shorter.
"Margaret Cole."
I looked at Ethan.
He was already watching my face.
"Mr.
Hale," I said carefully.
"What exactly has Margaret asked you to do?"
The answer he gave me made Ethan go completely still when I repeated it.
May you like
Margaret wasn't trying to explain herself.
She was trying to make us an offer.
