With my mind lost in the past, I was barely aware when I rose from the bed and paced across the hardwood floor.
“But no matter how many times the boy tried to reveal the truth, the daughter denied him, just like her birth mother had done years before. The boy lost his temper then, and who could blame him? Morrigan was a foolish little whelp who ran wild and ended up getting herself pregnant, just like her mother. The boy never meant to hurt her. Of course he didn’t, because attacking a pregnant woman is a cowardly act, and the boy was a man by then, and the farthest thing from a coward.”
My spine stiffened at the mere suggestion. Me, a coward? Ludicrous. The unfortunate turn had been Morrigan’s fault. The haughty, arrogant bitch took after her mother a little too much.
“She hit the boy first, you see. Called him all sorts of vile names. His reaction was instinctual, his lashing out reflexive. One little push, that was all. How was the boy to know that pregnancy had caused her center of gravity to change and impact her balance? He couldn’t possibly have guessed that his tiny shove would make her stumble and strike her head on the flagstones. If he’d injured her on purpose, would he have rushed her to the hospital, visited her every day in a disguise, to ensure that the innocent baby survived? The answer is no. Of course not.”
Old frustration cascaded through me as I recalled the unfortunate chain of events.
“Everything would have worked out fine if the boy hadn’t suspected that Morrigan recognized him during a visit and forced his hand. She was spiteful enough to ruin his life by crying assault, and then what would the boy do? In the end, she left him no choice. The boy couldn’t stomach a future in a prison cell, so once she returned home, he waited outside her house, hidden away in the bushes. One night when she ventured outside to grab her mail, he struck. He stifled her cries with a hand over her mouth and slit her throat. He remembers how warm her blood was when it gushed over his fingers. He laid her limp body on the walkway when she stopped struggling and slipped away.”
“What…what happened to the baby?”
The small, high voice made me whirl in my tracks. The shape of the lump beneath the covers suggested that Bethany was curled into the fetal position, and the eyes that peeked over the top of the blanket were wide with fear.
I’d been so swept up in the past that I’d failed to notice I’d shared the entire story out loud. I strolled back to the bed and smiled down into her pinched face. “Of all the babies the boy ever stole, Morrigan’s child was the one he took care of the most.”
Bethany’s eyelids drooped as fatigue settled in, but she jerked them open again, too wary to succumb to sleep when I was still so close.
“Clever girl.” A strange tenderness surged into the hardened space beneath my ribs. Keeping my touch gentle, I swept the hair off her forehead before grazing my knuckles along her sweet, soft cheek, whispering as her eyelids drifted shut again.
“Ma petite fille.”
26
Blue, purple, and red paint slashed across the white canvas in a riotous, violent outburst, dominating an entire wall in the gallery of the Gibbes Museum of Art. Helen Kline tilted her head to the left, then right. She tapped a French manicured nail to her chin as she attempted to puzzle out the meaning behind the nebulous shapes. The painting’s vivid colors had captured her attention from the moment she’d entered the special modern art exhibit in the third-floor gallery, but she had yet to make up her mind as to what she thought of the piece.
Hands on her hips, she stepped closer to the painting. When that didn’t do the trick, she sighed. This was why she preferred classical or more realistic art over most contemporary pieces. How was one to form an educated opinion over a painting’s merits when you weren’t even sure what you were viewing?
The beginning notes of a Bach concerto intruded on her ruminations. Helen plucked the phone from the zippered pocket of her Italian leather handbag and ended the alarm. Ten minutes until her appointment time with the new donor. She’d best start for their designated meeting spot in the second-floor atrium.
After one last glimpse of the confounding painting, she headed for the elevator, her low heels clicking across the blond hardwood floors. When the doors opened, a young mother pushing a towheaded toddler in a stroller exited, smelling of baby powder and spit-up.
Helen’s gaze tracked the woman and child until the doors slid shut and blocked them from view. She guessed the mother’s age at twenty-five, perhaps thirty. Around the same age as Eleanor.
She exhaled a long breath as the elevator squeaked its descent to the second floor. Why couldn’t that be her daughter pushing a stroller and enjoying a leisurely day at the museum? Helen sniffed, longing for one of those sweet beings to be on the agenda in the foreseeable future for Ellie.
Baby or not, why couldn’t Eleanor consider working in a nice, safe, culturally rich environment like the Gibbes Museum? Although Helen supposed any job would suffice, as long as the duties didn’t include Eleanor thrusting herself into harm’s way every five minutes.
Her daughter was so beautiful and intelligent. Helen entertained no doubts that she could succeed at whichever endeavor she chose.
Why, then, did her only girl insist on tormenting her mother by picking one of the most dangerous careers possible?
Helen smoothed the peach collar of her designer
