Chapter 3 - The Name His Wife Left Behind
I stared at Tyler's face until my hands went numb.
Adrien took the phone.
"Who is he?"
"My ex-boyfriend."
"The one who left?"
I nodded.
"He emptied our joint savings account after Grace died."
Adrien's jaw flexed.
"How much?"
"Does it matter?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because people don't accidentally steal money and appear inside locked bakeries connected to dead women."
I hated that he had a point.
Teresa looked at the picture.
"Do you know him?"
"No."
But something in her voice bothered me.
"You're lying."
She looked away.
Adrien caught it too.
"Teresa."
"I've seen him once."
"Where?"
"With Elena."
My stomach tightened.
"When?"
"Two months ago."
I sat down.
"No."
"Emma—"
"Tyler didn't know Elena."
"He did."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
I laughed bitterly.
"Everybody knows everything except me."
Adrien crouched in front of me.
The position reminded me painfully of the bakery.
Of him holding Luca.
"Then we change that."
I looked at him.
"How?"
"We open the box."
The second lock required Elena's key.
Adrien disappeared for twenty minutes.
When he returned, he was holding his wedding ring.
"I've worn this since the day she died."
He twisted the inner band.
A tiny metal piece slid free.
Elena had hidden a key inside his wedding ring.
Adrien stared at it.
"She knew I'd keep wearing it."
There was grief in his voice.
He inserted it.
Click.
Two locks open.
One remained.
Adrien entered the number into a keypad beneath the third lock.
Nothing.
"Maybe it's not a code," I said.
He looked at Luca's bracelet again.
Then Dr. Kaplan spoke.
"Room 307."
We turned.
"What?"
"The maternity wing."
Adrien frowned.
"Elena was in 412."
"After delivery."
The doctor looked sick.
"Before delivery, she spent one night in 307."
"Why?"
Silence.
Adrien stood.
"Why?"
Kaplan swallowed.
"She asked me to admit her privately."
"For what?"
"Tests."
"What tests?"
The doctor closed his eyes.
"DNA."
The air changed.
Adrien's expression became unreadable.
"Whose?"
"Luca's."
My stomach dropped.
Adrien didn't move.
"Are you telling me Elena questioned whether Luca was mine?"
"No."
"Then whose DNA was she testing?"
Kaplan looked at me.
I suddenly knew I wasn't going to like the answer.
"Grace's."
I couldn't breathe.
"What?"
"Elena had access to a sample through someone at the hospital."
I stood so quickly the chair fell.
"You tested my dead daughter's DNA without my permission?"
"I didn't."
"Then who?"
"Elena arranged it privately."
"Why?"
"I never saw the results."
Adrien grabbed the table.
"What was she looking for?"
Kaplan whispered:
"A family match."
My knees almost failed.
Luca cried from the next room.
The sound cut through everything.
I walked toward him automatically.
Inside the nursery, I lifted him.
His crying stopped almost immediately.
That terrified me now.
Every coincidence had begun to feel like evidence.
Adrien appeared in the doorway.
Neither of us spoke.
He looked at Luca.
Then me.
"No," I said.
"I didn't say anything."
"You were thinking it."
"I don't know what I'm thinking."
"Grace was Tyler's daughter."
"Are you certain?"
I stared at him.
"Get out."
"Emma—"
"Get out."
He did.
Ten minutes later, I found him sitting alone in the hallway.
"I'm sorry," he said.
I remained standing.
"Tyler and I were together four years."
Adrien nodded.
"He was there when I took the pregnancy test."
I swallowed.
"He painted the nursery."
My voice cracked.
"He held my hand during labor."
I looked away.
"Then Grace died, and he looked at me like I had failed some test."
Adrien said nothing.
"The next morning, he left."
"I'm sorry."
"So am I."
I sat beside him.
"What if everything I knew about him was fake?"
Adrien looked toward Luca's room.
"Then you're asking the wrong person."
"What?"
"I spent eleven years believing I knew my wife."
"And?"
"Apparently Elena spent her final months building puzzles around people I never met."
"Does that make you angry?"
"Yes."
"At her?"
A long pause.
"At myself."
"Why?"
"Because she was afraid."
He looked at his hands.
"And she didn't believe she could tell me."
That was the first moment I stopped seeing Adrien as danger.
He was just another person left behind by someone who had taken answers with them.
At dawn, Adrien's security team recovered footage from my bakery.
Tyler had entered using a key.
"My spare," I said.
"He told me he'd thrown it away."
The footage showed him going directly to my office.
Not searching.
Knowing.
He removed Grace's ultrasound picture.
Then reached behind the filing cabinet.
He found something taped there.
A memory card.
Adrien paused the footage.
"Did you put that there?"
"No."
"Rachel?"
"Six years ago? The filing cabinet wasn't even mine then."
Teresa whispered:
"Elena."
We all turned.
"She visited the bakery."
"When?"
"Eight months ago."
My skin prickled.
"I would remember her."
"You weren't there."
"How do you know?"
"Rachel told her when you took Mondays off."
I stood.
"Rachel told her?"
Teresa's face collapsed.
She had said too much.
Adrien rose.
"Rachel is alive."
Teresa didn't answer.
"Say it."
Tears appeared in her eyes.
"She was."
My heart stopped.
"Was?"
"Three months ago."
I crossed the room.
"Where?"
"I don't know now."
"Where was she?"
"Connecticut."
Six years.
Six years of birthdays.
Six years of my mother crying.
Six years of wondering whether Rachel had been scared when the car hit the river.
"Why didn't she come home?"
"To protect you."
I slapped Teresa.
The sound shocked everyone.
Including me.
"I'm sorry," I whispered immediately.
Teresa touched her cheek.
"No. You earned that."
"I didn't."
"You did."
She sat.
"Rachel discovered someone was using Elena's family charities to move money through shell companies. She took evidence. After her car went into the river, everyone assumed she was dead."
"Everyone except Elena."
"Yes."
"And Tyler?"
Teresa looked toward Adrien.
"Rachel believed Tyler was connected."
My chest tightened.
"Connected how?"
"We don't know."
Adrien's phone rang.
One of his men.
He listened.
"Where?"
His expression darkened.
"When?"
He ended the call.
"Tyler left the bakery."
"Where is he?"
"We don't know."
My phone vibrated again.
Another message.
This time from Tyler.
EMMA, THEY'RE LYING TO YOU.
Then:
ASK ADRIEN WHY HIS WIFE HAD GRACE'S DNA.
I looked up.
Adrien had gone pale.
"What?"
He didn't answer.
"Adrien."
He reached into his pocket.
Slowly.
Then placed a folded document on the table.
"I found this inside Elena's safe."
It was a laboratory report.
Two names appeared at the top.
LUCA VALENTE.
GRACE BROOKS.
Below them was one result.
Probability of biological relationship: 99.97%.
I stared at Adrien.
"What relationship?"
He turned the page.
May you like
And before I could read the final line, someone behind me whispered my sister's name.
"Rachel."
