Chapter 7 - THE DAUGHTER IN THE PHOTOGRAPH
Mara slapped Rowan.
The sound cracked through the medical room.
He did not defend himself.
He did not touch his face.
Caleb tried to rise from the bed, but pain forced him back.
“Answer him,” Mara said.
Rowan’s gaze remained on her.
“I did not hide your daughter.”
“That is not the same as saying there is no daughter.”
“No.”
Mara’s stomach twisted.
“Is she alive?”
“I do not know.”
“You knew about the pregnancy?”
“Yes.”
The room blurred.
“Who was the father?”
Rowan said nothing.
Mara stepped closer.
“Was it you?”
“Yes.”
Caleb closed his eyes.
Mara struck Rowan again.
This time, tears filled her vision.
“You let me believe I lost a stranger’s child.”
“I thought telling you would destroy you.”
“You thought?”
“You had no memory of that night. You woke after the crash. The doctor said the pregnancy had ended. You were already grieving and terrified.”
“So you lied.”
“I stayed silent.”
“That is a lie.”
“Yes.”
Caleb laughed bitterly.
“Finally, something we agree on.”
Mara turned toward him.
“How do you know the child survived?”
Caleb reached beneath the blanket.
He removed a folded photograph taped inside the waistband of his trousers.
A little girl sat on a wooden swing.
Dark curls.
Gray eyes.
Perhaps two and a half years old when the picture was taken.
Around her neck hung a silver pendant shaped like a raven.
The Graves symbol.
Mara took the photograph with shaking hands.
On the back, someone had written:
ELARA GRAVES.
AGE THREE.
PROPERTY OF THE CROWN.
Mara nearly collapsed.
Rowan caught her.
She tore away.
“Do not touch me.”
He stepped back.
“Where did you get this?” Rowan asked Caleb.
“The room where they held me.”
“Who is ‘they’?”
“Calder men. Petrov men. Both.”
“Where?”
“I was moved three times.”
Mara stared at the little girl.
The shape of her eyes.
The curve of her mouth.
She looked like Rowan.
But there was something of Mara’s mother in her too.
“No,” Mara whispered. “They told me the baby had no heartbeat.”
“The doctor was paid,” Rowan said.
She looked at him.
“You knew?”
“I discovered irregularities after the crash. The doctor disappeared. The hospital file was altered.”
“And you did not tell me?”
“I could not prove the child survived.”
“You could have told me she might have.”
“You had nightmares for months. You could not remember how you became pregnant.”
“So you decided ignorance was kinder?”
“I decided uncertainty might kill you.”
Mara’s voice shook.
“You keep making decisions about how much truth I can survive.”
Rowan closed his eyes briefly.
“Yes.”
“Why did I not remember being with you?”
Caleb turned his face away.
Rowan answered quietly.
“You had been drugged.”
Mara’s heart pounded.
“You took advantage of me?”
“No.”
The word came hard.
“Never.”
“Then how?”
“You came to me after the Whitlock Foundation gala. You were disoriented, but you knew who I was. I tried to call your father. You stopped me.”
“I do not remember.”
“I know.”
“Was I capable of consenting?”
Rowan’s face showed pain.
“I believed you were. In the morning, you remembered everything. We spoke. You told me it could never happen again.”
“And then?”
“Two days later, you did not remember the gala.”
Mara stared at him.
“The drug affected memory formation.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me then?”
“You were dating someone.”
“Caleb?”
“No. A man named Stephen Hale.”
Mara remembered Stephen.
A young attorney who had moved to Boston soon afterward.
“You said you were happy,” Rowan continued. “You asked why you had slept in my guest room. I told you that you became ill and I helped you.”
Mara pressed both hands against her temples.
Fragments moved in the darkness.
Rowan’s coat around her shoulders.
His voice telling her to drink water.
Her own hands pulling his face toward hers.
Heat.
Shame.
Safety.
Then nothing.
Caleb watched her.
“When did you learn she was pregnant?” he asked Rowan.
“After the crash.”
“How?”
“The emergency physician called me.”
“Why you?”
“Because Mara had written my number on the back of her insurance card.”
Mara had no memory of doing that.
Rowan continued.
“The physician believed I was the father. I went to the hospital. Daniel was already there.”
Mara slowly turned.
“My father knew.”
“Yes.”
The betrayal became too large to process.
“Why would he hide it?”
“He feared a child tied to the Graves family would destroy your arrangement with Stephen’s family.”
“My father planned that marriage too?”
“Yes.”
Mara gripped the photograph.
“Everyone arranged my life while I was unconscious.”
No one contradicted her.
She looked at Caleb.
“Did you know when we became engaged?”
“No.”
“Would it have changed anything?”
Caleb’s expression broke.
“I loved you.”
“That is not an answer.”
“No,” he admitted. “It would not have changed how I loved you. But it might have changed whether Rowan allowed me to.”
Rowan’s jaw tightened.
“Do not turn this into jealousy.”
“It has always been jealousy.”
“You were my brother.”
“And she was the woman you loved.”
Mara shouted, “Stop speaking about me as if I am not here.”
Both men fell silent.
She looked down at the photograph.
“Where is Elara?”
Caleb shook his head.
“I do not know.”
“Did you see her?”
“On a live video.”
“How do you know it was live?”
“She held up a newspaper from that morning.”
Mara’s breath trembled.
“Was she hurt?”
“No. She looked healthy.”
“Afraid?”
Caleb hesitated.
“Tell me.”
“She called Thomas Calder ‘Grandfather.’”
Rowan turned away.
Mara felt sick.
Thomas was Rowan’s uncle, not his father.
But if Thomas had raised the little girl, he may have taught her anything.
“The White Crown,” Mara said.
Caleb nodded.
“I heard them mention a private residence beneath the hotel.”
Rowan reached for his phone.
Caleb grabbed his wrist.
“You cannot storm it.”
Rowan looked down at his hand.
“Release me.”
“They will move her.”
“I said release me.”
Caleb did.
Rowan called Marcus.
“Prepare surveillance on the White Crown. No contact. No visible units.”
He ended the call.
Mara studied him.
“You knew there was a chance she lived for three years.”
“Yes.”
“And never searched?”
“I searched.”
“Quietly.”
“Yes.”
“Without me.”
“Yes.”
Her anger became cold.
“When this is over, I may never forgive you.”
Rowan nodded.
“I know.”
“But first, you are going to help me find her.”
“I will.”
“And Caleb comes.”
Rowan looked at the wounded man.
“No.”
“I saw the interior,” Caleb said. “You need me.”
“You can barely stand.”
“I stood long enough to escape.”
Rowan’s eyes narrowed.
Mara stepped between them.
“Both of you will stop deciding who is useful.”
She held up the photograph.
“This is my daughter.”
Rowan’s face changed when she said the word.
My daughter.
His daughter too.
For three years, they had both been parents without knowing whether their child breathed.
Mara’s voice broke.
“We find her together.”
Caleb looked at the photograph.
“And afterward?”
Mara knew what he meant.
The engagement.
The marriage.
The future the three of them had shattered.
“Afterward,” she said, “I decide what happens to my life.”
Neither man argued.
Outside, snow began falling over Chicago, covering the wet streets in white.
May you like
Inside the photograph, Elara Graves sat on a swing beneath summer sunlight.
Waiting for parents she had never been told existed.
