Chapter 2 - The Man Who Paid
Emma woke believing she was underwater.
Sound reached her in distorted pieces.
A monitor.
Footsteps.
A woman's voice.
Someone saying her blood pressure.
She tried to move.
Pain stopped her.
Not the savage pain from her kitchen floor.
Something deeper.
Heavy.
Her eyelids opened.
White ceiling.
Fluorescent light.
A tube under her nose.
She turned her head.
Ruth sat asleep in a chair, arms folded, chin against her chest.
For several seconds Emma couldn't remember why.
Then she saw the yellow ribbon tied around Ruth's handbag.
One of the baby-shower ribbons.
Memory slammed back.
Seventeen calls.
Her mother's message.
The floor.
The neighbor.
Then nothing.
Emma made a sound.
Ruth woke immediately.
"Oh, honey."
She was beside the bed in seconds.
Emma's voice barely existed.
"Where?"
"Hospital."
"Surgery?"
Ruth nodded.
"Your appendix ruptured."
Emma closed her eyes.
Ruth hesitated.
"The surgeon will explain everything."
"My mom?"
Ruth's expression answered before her words did.
"She came."
"When?"
"After."
That one word carried enough meaning.
Emma looked toward the window.
Morning sunlight.
She had lost an entire day.
"Madison?"
"She came too."
"The shower?"
"Canceled."
Emma swallowed.
Guilt appeared automatically.
Ruth saw it.
"No."
Emma looked at her.
"Don't."
"What?"
"Don't feel guilty about that shower."
Emma stared at her.
Ruth's voice softened.
"You almost died."
A doctor entered a few minutes later.
Tall.
Dark hair touched with gray at the temples.
Calm eyes.
"Elias Grant."
Emma remembered nothing about him.
"I operated on you."
She tried to smile.
"Guess I should say thanks."
"You can start by staying alive."
Ruth laughed quietly.
Emma noticed Elias didn't.
He pulled a chair closer.
"Your appendix ruptured before you reached us. The infection spread quickly. During surgery, your blood pressure collapsed."
Emma watched his face.
"How bad?"
He didn't evade.
"Your heart stopped."
Her fingers tightened around the blanket.
"For how long?"
"About a minute and a half."
Emma stared at him.
"So I died."
"You experienced cardiac arrest. We got you back."
She looked down.
A strange laugh escaped her.
Of all the thoughts that could have come, one seemed absurdly clear.
"My mother had centerpieces to finish."
Ruth looked away.
Elias remained silent.
Emma wiped at her cheek.
She hadn't realized she was crying.
Then Elias said, "There's something else."
Emma looked up.
"Yesterday evening, a woman identifying herself as your mother attempted to arrange an early discharge."
Emma blinked.
"What?"
"You were still sedated."
"Why?"
"She said you'd recover better at home."
Emma stared at the ceiling.
"That makes no sense."
"I agree."
"Did she sign anything?"
"No."
Emma turned her head sharply despite the pain.
"Why not?"
"Because another person contacted the hospital before she arrived and instructed us not to accept third-party decisions on your behalf unless legally authorized."
"What person?"
"A man named Samuel Hayes."
Emma's expression changed.
"Who?"
"He paid your hospital balance."
Emma laughed once because the sentence was too ridiculous.
"What hospital balance?"
"All of it."
"I have insurance."
"Your expected remaining responsibility was significant."
"How significant?"
Elias told her.
Emma stopped laughing.
"That's impossible."
"Apparently not."
"Who is he?"
"I was hoping you knew."
Emma shook her head.
"Never heard that name."
Elias studied her.
"He seemed to know you."
A nurse entered to check medication.
Emma waited until she left.
Then she asked, "What did he say?"
Elias hesitated.
"He asked us to tell him when you woke."
"That's creepy."
"Maybe."
"And?"
"He said no one should remove you from this hospital against your wishes."
Emma looked toward Ruth.
Ruth looked equally confused.
"There was another thing," Elias said.
"You said a name when you woke up."
Emma frowned.
"What name?"
"Michael."
Her entire body went still.
Ruth noticed.
Elias noticed.
Emma looked toward the window.
"Michael was my father."
"Robert isn't your father?"
"Stepfather."
"Where is Michael?"
"Dead."
The room became quiet.
"How long?"
"I was six."
Elias sat back.
Emma rarely spoke about Michael Hayes.
Her memories of him were fragments.
A blue bicycle.
Peppermint gum.
A laugh in a garage.
A silver watch.
Then one afternoon her mother told her there had been an accident.
After that, Michael disappeared from every conversation.
Within two years Diane married Robert Carter.
Within another year Madison was born.
Emma's last name eventually became Carter.
Her father's name became something people corrected themselves away from.
Hayes.
Emma's eyes snapped back toward Elias.
"Samuel Hayes."
"Yes."
"My father's last name was Hayes."
Ruth sat forward.
"Relative?"
"I don't know."
Emma suddenly felt colder.
"Did he leave a number?"
Elias nodded.
"I can have him contacted."
"No."
The answer came too fast.
Elias waited.
Emma's heart monitor accelerated slightly.
"I don't want strangers showing up."
"Fair."
Ruth touched her arm.
"Honey, he paid your bill."
"That doesn't make him safe."
"No," Ruth agreed. "But it makes him unusual."
That afternoon Madison visited alone.
She looked exhausted.
Her hair was tied into a messy bun.
No makeup.
No baby-shower dress.
She stood beside Emma's bed and cried before saying anything.
Emma watched her.
"I'm sorry."
Madison shook her head.
"No. I'm sorry."
"You didn't know."
"I should've."
"How?"
Madison sat.
"Because this isn't new."
Emma looked away.
"Madison—"
"Please."
Emma turned back.
Her sister wiped her cheeks.
"I spent my whole life letting them make everything about me."
"You were a kid."
"I'm thirty."
"Twenty-eight."
"Close enough."
Despite herself, Emma smiled faintly.
Madison took her hand.
"When Mom told me you called seventeen times, I thought she was exaggerating."
Emma said nothing.
"Then I saw the call log."
"How?"
"Dr. Grant showed me your phone."
Emma's eyebrows rose.
"Did he?"
"He wanted to know whether there was anyone else to contact."
Madison lowered her voice.
"Emma, why did Mom try to discharge you?"
"I was about to ask you."
"I don't know."
"She didn't tell you?"
"No."
Madison glanced toward the door.
"But she and Dad are acting strange."
"They always act strange around consequences."
"I'm serious."
Emma studied her.
Madison leaned closer.
"When we got home last night, they were arguing."
"About me?"
"I thought so."
"What did they say?"
"I only heard pieces."
Madison hesitated.
"Mom said, 'If Emma talks to him, she'll find out.'"
Emma's stomach tightened for reasons having nothing to do with surgery.
"Talks to who?"
"I don't know."
"And Dad?"
"He said, 'Then we should've handled this years ago.'"
Emma went quiet.
Madison reached into her purse.
"There was something else."
She placed an envelope on Emma's blanket.
Old.
Cream-colored.
Emma looked at it.
Her name was written across the front.
EMMA MICHELLE HAYES.
She hadn't been called that in twenty-five years.
"Where did you get this?"
"I found it in Mom's desk."
Emma stared at her.
"You went through her desk?"
"After hearing them argue, yes."
Emma touched the envelope.
"Did you open it?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because it has your name on it."
Emma turned it over.
The seal had already been broken.
Years ago.
Inside was a folded legal document.
She opened it carefully.
The first line contained her father's name.
MICHAEL DAVID HAYES.
The second contained hers.
Then a phrase.
IRREVOCABLE TRUST FOR THE BENEFIT OF EMMA MICHELLE HAYES.
Emma's mouth went dry.
Madison whispered, "What is it?"
Emma kept reading.
Her father had established a trust six months before his death.
Education.
Medical expenses.
Housing.
Additional principal distribution at age thirty.
Emma was thirty-one.
She had never seen this document.
Never heard of any trust.
Her eyes moved to the trustee's name.
SAMUEL R. HAYES.
Emma stopped breathing.
Madison saw it.
"That's him, isn't it?"
Emma nodded slowly.
"The man who paid the hospital."
At the bottom of the page was a handwritten note in blue ink.
Not legal language.
A message.
Emma recognized the handwriting.
She still had one birthday card from her father stored in a box.
The same slanted M.
The same uneven E.
For Emma.
If anything happens to me, Samuel will protect what belongs to you.
Trust him before you trust anyone who tells you I left you with nothing.
Love, Dad.
Emma read it three times.
Madison covered her mouth.
"Oh my God."
Emma's eyes burned.
"My mother told me there was nothing."
"Maybe she didn't know."
"The envelope was in her desk."
Madison went silent.
Emma continued through the paperwork.
A paragraph had been highlighted.
Distributions made during Emma's minority required guardian acknowledgment.
Below it were signatures.
Diane Hayes.
Later Diane Carter.
Years of them.
Emma's pulse quickened.
"What were these payments?"
Madison asked.
Emma turned pages.
Tuition.
Medical expenses.
Living support.
But the numbers made no sense.
Her college tuition had been covered by loans.
She still owed forty thousand dollars.
She had paid her own rent since age nineteen.
She had postponed dental surgery at twenty-two because she couldn't afford it.
Yet according to these records, money had been distributed for her.
A lot of money.
"Emma?"
She looked at Madison.
"My mother received money for me."
"How much?"
Emma kept adding mentally.
She stopped.
"More than two hundred thousand dollars."
Madison's face turned white.
At that moment the door opened.
Diane stood there.
She saw Madison.
Then the papers.
And whatever mask she had worn into the room disappeared.
"Where did you get that?"
Madison stood.
"Your desk."
Diane's face hardened.
"You had no right."
Emma's voice was quiet.
"Neither did you."
Diane looked at her.
For the first time since Emma was a child, her mother seemed afraid of her.
"It's complicated."
"Then explain."
"You just had surgery."
"Explain."
"Not here."
"Why did you take money from Dad's trust?"
"I didn't take it."
"Your signature is everywhere."
"It was used for the family."
Emma stared at her.
"The family."
"We were struggling."
"I took student loans."
"Robert's business was failing."
"I worked two jobs."
"We had Madison to raise."
The words entered the room and hung there.
Madison flinched.
Emma looked at her mother.
"So you used money Dad left for me to raise Madison."
Diane's eyes filled with tears.
"That isn't fair."
Emma actually smiled.
Not because anything was funny.
Because the sentence was incredible.
"Fair?"
Diane stepped closer.
"I made choices because I had two children."
"You had one child's money."
Diane lowered her voice.
"Samuel never understood what I went through."
"So you know him."
Diane stopped.
Emma's gaze sharpened.
"You know exactly who he is."
"Emma—"
"And that's why you tried to get me out of this hospital."
"No."
"Then why?"
Diane looked toward Madison.
"Because if Samuel sees you—"
She stopped.
Emma waited.
"If Samuel sees me what?"
Diane shook her head.
"Nothing."
Emma reached for the call button.
"What are you doing?"
"Calling Dr. Grant."
"Why?"
"Because I'm requesting security."
Diane stared at her daughter.
"You would have your own mother removed?"
Emma's voice remained calm.
"You left me dying on a kitchen floor because you had balloons to hang."
Diane recoiled.
Before she could answer, someone knocked.
Elias entered.
Behind him stood a tall man in his early sixties wearing a charcoal suit.
Silver hair.
Controlled posture.
His face carried no obvious resemblance to Emma.
Until he looked at her.
His eyes did.
The same gray-green eyes she remembered from childhood photographs of her father.
Emma's fingers tightened around the trust papers.
Diane whispered one word.
"Samuel."
The man didn't look at her.
He looked only at Emma.
His expression broke.
"You have Michael's eyes."
Emma said nothing.
Samuel stepped into the room.
Then he placed a small silver watch on the table beside her bed.
Emma stopped breathing.
She knew that watch.
Her father had worn it every day.
Samuel looked at Diane.
"I think thirty-one years is long enough."
Diane backed toward the door.
"Don't."
May you like
Samuel turned toward Emma.
"Your father did not die in the accident your mother told you about."
