“Eddie, anything can happen. Papers like that need to be kept somewhere safe,” Eleanor had said then, just before Natalie came home from work.
Now he stood in the doorway, unable to take another step. He understood in that instant that the life he knew had shattered like porcelain on concrete.
— Where is my daughter? — Natalie asked in a cold voice that didn’t sound like her own.
Thoughts raced through Edward’s head, but he couldn’t grab hold of a single one.
— Honey, you know our daughter was stillborn, — he stammered.
— I’m asking you where my daughter is. If I don’t get an answer right now, I’m going to the police in the morning. This chart is more than enough to start with.
— Natalie, wait. We were trying to do what was best. Mom said if we kept the baby, we’d have no future, — Edward said, trying to justify himself even as he knew he couldn’t.
— Last time: where is my daughter?
There were no tears in Natalie’s voice, no hysteria — just the hard edge of someone prepared to hear the truth and act on it.
— Natalie, I don’t know exactly. They took her to a good care facility. Mom said it was best for everyone, especially for her.
Edward started repeating his mother’s arguments, but Natalie wasn’t listening. In a matter of minutes, the man she had loved had become something small and slippery in her eyes — someone cornered, still wriggling for escape. She looked at him with disgust and couldn’t understand how she had ever trusted him enough to build a life with him.
— Natalie, if you want, I’ll find out tomorrow exactly where she is. I’ll talk to Mom. We can fix this. Maybe we can bring her home and raise her.
— Call your mother. Tell her to come here right now. I want to know tonight what happened, — Natalie said, just as coldly.
— But honey, it’s late. Let’s talk in the morning. Things always look different after some sleep, — Edward said, trying for a smile and producing only a weak grimace.
— Call her.
Edward went into the kitchen. Through the partly open door Natalie could hear him apologizing over and over like a schoolboy caught cheating. When he came back into the living room, he was white as a sheet.
— She’s on her way, — he said, sinking to the floor and covering his face with his hands.
Eleanor arrived forty minutes later. Natalie opened the door herself, since Edward was sitting in a daze and seemed barely aware of anything around him. Eleanor greeted her briefly, walked into the living room, and sat down in an armchair. Outwardly she looked composed. Only the trembling of her little fingers gave her away…
