f she's telling the truth? The words circled in his mind, each passing carving deeper grooves of doubt into everything he thought he knew abo

ingering on the edge of the photograph that still stared up at him Eleanor Delaware, young and hopeful, holding a baby that shared his father's eyes

id, pocketing his phone.

edge had dulled into something quieter, something that looked almost unease. It was a rare sight, one Jerry hadn't seen since they we

ou saying?"

watch the last of the party guests stumble into their waiting cars. "But what if she came here because she's just as lost as we a

ty-five years ago. He hadn't read it yet, but the weight of it pressed against his consciousness like a hand again

hich outcome fri

he photographs and the hospital records until he found the folded sheets of paper, yellowed at the edges and creased along well-w

w, his expression guarded. "You

m s

nodded, a single sharp motion, and crossed to the door. He

s," he said. "And I'm going to watch

approac

e all night, a ghost of his usual smirk returned. "Not yet, anyway. B

hut behind him, an

e Alistair's death, as if the leather might burn him and unfol

ea

e rest of your life, and I've made peace with that. But I need you to understand that

child. His eyes raced down the page, hungry

everything you, me, the life we could have had. So I'm making a choice. I'm choosing to let you go. I'm choosing

oment I saw her. And I will spend the rest of my life trying t

ning. His father had had another child. A daughter. A child he'd given up to protect from the

child was

ut the tone was different softer, more vulnerable, stripped of the cold authority that had defined Alistair Pillar's every public interac

gender. But the timeline was clear this letter had been written around

ether in Jerry's mind

he woman who had taken in a child that didn't belong to her and raised her as

one else entirely. Someone Alistair Pillar ha

ng before his brain could fully process the d

wasn't Anne's mother. She was a cover. I need to know who the real mother was, and

of the line. Then his investigator

e like you asked. She was adopted at birth. Closed adoption. The records are sealed, but I f

nd of no

the woman who gave bi

ghtened on the

d when he spoke again, his voi

Pillar. Yo

the desk. He sat there, frozen, the letter still clutch

her, who had died when he and Jefferson were fifteen, had spent her final years lock

r once mentioned the dau

alculating instinct that had been drilled into him since childhood. Jerry fo

ry had spent the past hour cataloging every detail of Anne Delaware, the stubborn set of her jaw, the fire in her eyes when she'd challenged him, the way she'd refused to break

o her hadn't been brot

of his mind where he stored his darkest impulses. There was so

if Margaret was the mother, why would Alistair give his own wife's child to another woman? Why would he hide the p

d been placed there for a reason a cover, a protection, a lie designed t

esk, still open, still bearing the inscript

. 1

0. The year didn't match. And if Eleanor wasn't the m

something els

ad done so before Anne was born before the timeline of her life had even begun. That meant the secret it car

s number, his jaw ti

ed you to find Anne, but don't touch her. Don't even let he

at did y

h certificate, at the photograph of a b

id quietly. "And I nee

son could respond, his g

and forged documents and a mother who had died without e

er she really was, held

d the locket, his knuckles

ruth. Even if it de

it destr