Chapter 5
I forgot how to breathe.
Daniel stared at me.
The road ahead blurred.
“Say that again.”
Noah’s voice shook.
“Ethan is your son.”
“How do you know?”
“Grandpa has papers.”
“What papers?”
“DNA stuff. Hospital stuff. He keeps them in a metal box.”
“Where are you?”
“I told you, I don’t know.”
“Look around. Anything. A number. A mailbox.”
“I’m inside.”
“Can you get outside safely?”
“I think so.”
Ethan whispered something in the background.
Noah said, “We have to go. His grandma is waking up.”
Relief crashed through me.
“Grandma is alive?”
“Yes.”
“Is she hurt?”
“She hit her head.”
I pulled onto the shoulder again.
“Listen to me, Noah. You keep Ethan and Patricia safe. I’m calling the police.”
“No police.”
“What?”
“Grandpa said if police come, he’ll burn everything.”
“I don’t care about papers.”
“You will.”
“No, I care about Ethan.”
There was silence.
Then Noah said something that made my stomach drop.
“The papers say my mom didn’t die in a car accident.”
The line disconnected.
I immediately called back.
No answer.
Again.
Nothing.
I called 911.
This time I told them everything I could without sounding completely insane.
My mother missing.
My son missing.
Possible abduction.
Robert Collins.
Rachel’s location.
A cabin or rural property west of Denver.
Red barn.
Trees.
They started coordinating with Jefferson County.
Daniel sat silently beside me.
Then he said, “If Ethan is yours, why did the test say he was mine?”
“I don’t know.”
He rubbed his face.
“Maybe it wasn’t Ethan’s sample.”
“Rachel said her mother had access.”
“Your wife has a dead mother who isn’t dead, a dead sister who died later than she claimed, and a father who kidnaps children.”
“You think I need the summary?”
He flinched.
“Sorry.”
I stared ahead.
Then I asked the question that had been sitting between us.
“Did you love her?”
Daniel went quiet.
“Rachel.”
“Yes.”
“A long time ago.”
“While she was with me?”
“Yes.”
I nodded slowly.
No rage this time.
No punch.
I was too tired.
“How long?”
“Four months.”
“Was it serious?”
“For me.”
“And for her?”
“I thought so.”
“What happened?”
“She ended it.”
“Why?”
“She said she chose you.”
I laughed once.
“That supposed to make me feel better?”
“No.”
“Did you know we were engaged?”
“Not at first.”
“But eventually?”
“Yes.”
“And you stayed?”
He looked out the window.
“Yes.”
“At least you’re honest now.”
He nodded.
“I should have been eight years ago.”
“Yes.”
“I was twenty-nine. Selfish. Angry. I told myself your relationship was already broken if she was seeing me.”
“It wasn’t.”
“I know that now.”
“My wife was planning our wedding while sleeping with you.”
“Yes.”
I let that sit.
Then Daniel said, “There’s something else.”
Of course there was.
“What?”
“I wasn’t in that hospital photo because Ethan was mine.”
I turned toward him.
“What?”
“Rachel called me the night she delivered.”
“Why?”
“She was panicking. She said a baby had been born and her family was doing something illegal. She asked me to come.”
“And you did.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“She begged me not to.”
I laughed bitterly.
“You seem to do that a lot.”
“I loved her.”
“And that made you stupid.”
“Yes.”
He didn’t defend himself.
That somehow made me angrier.
“The baby in the picture,” he continued, “wasn’t Ethan.”
I stared.
“Who was it?”
“I always assumed it was Ethan.”
“You just said—”
“Rachel never told me his name. Not that night. She just said, ‘Hold him.’ A nurse took the picture.”
“Margaret?”
“No. Another nurse.”
“Then how do you know it wasn’t Ethan?”
“Because of the date Rachel wrote on the back.”
I looked at him.
“That was before Ethan was born?”
“If Noah is two weeks older, then yes.”
My stomach twisted.
The baby Daniel had held beside Rachel was probably Noah.
The photograph that had supposedly proven an affair and secret birth proved something else entirely.
It proved Daniel had been there while Rachel’s family manipulated whatever was happening inside that hospital.
“Did you see Sarah?”
“I saw a girl.”
“Seventeen?”
“Maybe.”
“What happened?”
“She was crying in a hallway.”
“What did she say?”
Daniel closed his eyes, searching eight-year-old memories.
“She grabbed my arm.”
“And?”
“She asked if I was James.”
My heart stopped.
“What did you tell her?”
“I said no.”
“What happened then?”
“She said, ‘Tell James they’re stealing his name.’”
I felt ice move through my body.
“Why didn’t you ask what she meant?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“Margaret came out and pulled her away.”
“You never told Rachel?”
“I did.”
“What did she say?”
“She said Sarah was medicated and confused.”
I almost screamed.
Eight years.
Every person had carried one little piece of the truth.
And nobody had ever placed them on the same table.
My phone rang.
Rachel.
I answered immediately.
“Where are you?”
Her voice was quiet.
“At my father’s house.”
“Is he there?”
“No.”
“Police are looking for him.”
“You called them?”
“Yes.”
“I told you to. Good.”
“Rachel, Ethan called.”
Silence.
“He’s okay?”
“For now.”
She started crying.
“Oh God.”
“He’s with Noah and my mother.”
“Where?”
“They don’t know.”
“James, my father has three properties.”
“Send them to me.”
“I’m doing it now.”
“Why did Robert take them?”
“I found out this afternoon.”
“Found out what?”
“The medical test I was supposed to get.”
“What about it?”
“It wasn’t for me.”
I shut my eyes.
“Of course it wasn’t.”
“It was for Ethan.”
“Why?”
“My mother mailed me a blood sample last week with a note.”
“What note?”
“She said, ‘If you want to know who your son is, compare this.’”
“Compare it to what?”
“To Ethan.”
I frowned.
“The blood belonged to Noah?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
“My father.”
Daniel and I looked at each other.
I didn’t understand.
Rachel continued.
“My mother thought Noah might be my father’s son.”
For a second, I thought I had misheard her.
“What?”
“My father abused Sarah.”
The words landed like stones.
Daniel looked away.
My anger became something much colder.
“Was Noah his child?”
“I don’t know. The hospital test was supposed to tell me.”
“And you went to meet Daniel instead.”
“Because my mother called and said the test had been canceled.”
“Why?”
“She said someone changed the sample.”
Again.
Always samples.
Always switched evidence.
Always a family built on altered labels.
Rachel continued.
“She told me not to trust any DNA test unless I watched the samples collected myself.”
“So the test with Daniel could be false.”
“Yes.”
“And Noah says Robert has records proving Ethan is mine.”
“I believe him.”
My throat tightened.
I wanted to believe it too.
But the strange thing was this:
Whether Ethan carried my DNA suddenly felt almost unimportant.
I had spent the last several hours terrified of losing him.
Not because of biology.
Because I loved him.
That was the answer I should have known immediately.
I was his father.
Whatever the paper said.
I heard a sound on Rachel’s end.
A floorboard.
Then she whispered, “Someone’s here.”
“Rachel?”
No answer.
“Rachel?”
A man’s voice came over the phone.
Calm.
Older.
“Hello, James.”
Robert Collins.
I sat perfectly still.
“Where is my son?”
“Which one?”
Daniel’s eyes widened.
“Don’t play games.”
“I’m not.”
“Where is Ethan?”
“Safe.”
“My mother?”
“Also safe, despite her irritating habit of interfering.”
“If you touched her—”
“Threats are emotional, James. Emotion makes people careless.”
I wanted to climb through the phone.
“Tell me where they are.”
“Soon.”
“Why did you take them?”
“Because I need something from you.”
“Money?”
Robert laughed.
“You think this is about money?”
“Yes.”
“It was eight years ago.”
“What changed?”
“You did.”
“What does that mean?”
“You became trustee.”
My grandfather’s estate.
I had taken over control of Ethan’s trust six months earlier after the original bank trustee retired.
Robert continued.
“There is a document in your home safe.”
My pulse quickened.
“What document?”
“The original trust amendment signed by Walter Miller.”
I knew it.
My grandfather had added a handwritten clause shortly before his death.
The funds passed only to a biological descendant proven by independent DNA testing.
At the time, it had seemed paranoid.
Now it felt prophetic.
Robert said, “Bring it to me.”
“Why?”
“Because that document is the only thing standing between Noah and three million dollars.”
I went cold.
“Then Noah isn’t my son.”
Robert laughed again.
“That depends which truth you prefer.”
“What does that mean?”
“You bring the document, and I’ll give you Ethan, your mother, and every original hospital record.”
“And Rachel?”
Silence.
My voice hardened.
“What about my wife?”
Robert spoke almost gently.
“Rachel is already here.”
I looked at the phone.
“But she just said—”
A sharp scream exploded through the speaker.
May you like
Rachel.
Then the call ended.
