Chapter 5: The Things She Had Already Set in Motion
The two people in dark coats introduced themselves as investigators from the state family services oversight board.
The woman's name was Agent Doyle.
The man did not give his name.
He stood near the door and did not move from it.
Agent Doyle asked Rebecca to sit down.
Rebecca did not sit.
"Ms.
Calloway," Agent Doyle said, "we've been looking into the Hillcroft program for approximately four months.
Your connection to it came up eleven days ago.
We've been waiting to see if today's event would clarify a few things."
"I have nothing to clarify," Rebecca said.
"I haven't done anything illegal."
"The forged signature on a residential placement agreement is a start," Agent Doyle said.
"But that's not primarily what we're here about."
I was still holding Emily's note.
I folded it again, carefully, and put it back in my jacket.
"What are you here about?" I asked.
Agent Doyle looked at me.
"How much do you know about how you and Ms.
Calloway met?"
The question didn't make sense for a moment.
Then it did.
"We met at a fundraising dinner," I said.
"Fourteen months ago.
A charity event for children's grief support.
My wife had just—" I stopped.
"My wife had just passed.
My company bought a table."
"Who invited you to that dinner?" Agent Doyle said.
I thought about it.
"A colleague.
Marcus Webb.
He said it was a good cause and that I needed to get out of the house."
"And Marcus Webb," Agent Doyle said, "is Ms.
Calloway's cousin."
The chapel had mostly emptied by now.
A few guests remained near the back, not leaving, not speaking.
My mother had taken Emily to the small anteroom off the side of the nave.
Through the half-open door I could see Emily sitting on a wooden chair, my mother kneeling in front of her, talking quietly.
I turned back to Agent Doyle.
"She arranged to meet me," I said.
"We believe so, yes."
I looked at Rebecca.
She was standing very straight.
Her bouquet was still on the floor where she'd dropped it.
She had not picked it up.
"The dinner," I said.
"The table placement.
You were seated next to me."
"Daniel—"
"Was any of it accidental?"
She said nothing.
"Two years," I said.
"Emily calling you by your name.
Helping with homework.
The weekends." I stopped.
"Was any of it real?"
"Of course it was real." Her voice shifted — softer now, something that in another moment I might have believed.
"What I felt for you was real.
What I wanted for us was real.
I just—" She paused.
"Emily was always going to be a problem.
Not because of who she is.
Because of what she represents to you.
You were never going to fully move forward while she was—"
"She is my daughter."
"She is your anchor," Rebecca said.
"She is the reason you still sleep on the left side of the bed.
She is the reason you haven't touched your wife's studio.
She is the reason you agreed to marry me but couldn't say the word love without pausing first."
The chapel was very quiet.
I did not answer, because some part of what she had said was true, and she knew it, and she was using it like a tool.
"That doesn't make what you did acceptable," I said finally.
"I know that," she said.
"But I need you to understand that I wasn't trying to hurt her.
I was trying to build something that could actually survive."
"By removing her from her home."
"By giving her a structured environment while we established—"
"She is seven," I said.
"Her mother d*ed fourteen months ago.
And you enrolled her in a residential program without my knowledge and forged my name to do it."
Rebecca closed her eyes briefly.
Agent Doyle stepped forward.
"Ms.
Calloway, I need to ask you to come with us.
We have a number of documents we need to go through with you, and I'd prefer to do that somewhere more appropriate."
"Am I being detained?"
"You're being asked to cooperate voluntarily," Agent Doyle said.
"For now."
Rebecca looked at me one more time.
The softness was gone.
What was left was something I recognized — the version of her face I had seen in small moments over two years, when she thought I wasn't paying attention.
The version that was always measuring.
"You should know," she said, "that Marcus has copies of everything I have on your company's charitable trust filings.
If this becomes adversarial, that becomes relevant."
Agent Doyle said, "Ms.
Calloway—"
"I'm simply making sure Daniel understands the full picture," Rebecca said.
I looked at her for a long moment.
"I'm going to go be with my daughter now," I said.
I turned and walked toward the anteroom.
Behind me, I heard Agent Doyle say Rebecca's name again, firmly this time.
I did not look back.
Through the half-open door, Emily was still sitting in the wooden chair.
My mother had her hand.
Emily's flowers had finally come completely loose and were sitting in her lap, and she was holding them like she wasn't sure whether to put them back or let them go.
She looked up when I came in.
"Is it over?" she said.
I sat down beside her.
"Not quite yet," I said.
"But it's going to be."
May you like
She leaned against my arm.
Outside, I heard the chapel doors open and close.
