Chapter 2 - The Promise She Made Her Mother
Nathan's penthouse was not where they went.
That surprised Ellie.
She had expected the rich stranger to put them into his expensive car and decide everything for her.
Instead, Nathan called a family crisis center, requested an emergency advocate, and remained with Ellie in the grocery-store café until a social worker named Teresa arrived.
Nathan bought Ellie a glass of milk.
She drank it slowly.
Too slowly.
He realized she was rationing it.
"You can have another."
"I'm saving some."
"For later?"
She nodded.
Nathan ordered two more.
Only then did she finish the first.
Teresa arrived twenty minutes later.
She was a middle-aged woman with kind eyes and practical shoes.
Ellie immediately moved her chair backward.
Nathan noticed.
Teresa did too.
She didn't approach.
"Hi, Ellie."
"How do you know my name?"
"Nathan told me."
Ellie shot him a betrayed look.
Nathan remained calm.
"Only your first name."
Teresa sat several feet away.
"I heard you have two brothers."
Ellie tightened her hold on Jamie.
"Nobody takes them."
"Okay."
"You promise?"
Teresa didn't lie.
"I can't promise what a judge will decide. But I can promise I'm going to listen."
Ellie stared at her.
That answer, strangely, seemed to earn more trust than reassurance would have.
Over the next hour, the truth emerged piece by piece.
Their mother, Sarah Mercer, had been twenty-nine.
She worked nights cleaning offices and days whenever she could find childcare.
The twins had been born early.
Their father had disappeared before their birth.
Then came the fire.
An electrical heater in their apartment sparked while Sarah was sleeping.
Ellie remembered smoke.
She remembered her mother's scream.
She remembered Sarah pushing all three children toward a window.
A neighbor helped Ellie and the twins escape.
Sarah never came out.
Afterward came hospitals, police officers, temporary rooms, forms, relatives, questions.
An aunt agreed to take Ellie but not the babies.
Another relative offered to take Noah but not Jamie.
Ellie heard adults discussing separation.
So she ran.
She took the twins.
She took her mother's coat.
And she disappeared.
Nathan listened without interrupting.
"You've been alone three weeks?"
Teresa asked.
Ellie shook her head.
"People helped."
"Who?"
"A church lady gave us blankets."
"Anyone else?"
"A man at a diner gave me bread."
"Where did you get formula?"
Ellie looked down.
"The hospital gave us some."
"And after that?"
Silence.
Nathan felt sick.
"Ellie."
She wouldn't look at him.
"What have you been feeding them?"
"Whatever I could."
Teresa closed her eyes briefly.
Nathan stood and walked toward the window because he was afraid Ellie would see his anger.
Not anger at her.
At everyone.
At a city filled with institutions, money, churches, government agencies, corporations, charities—and somehow an eight-year-old had been left calculating the price of milk with twenty-seven cents.
Teresa arranged emergency medical evaluations for the twins.
Nathan insisted Ellie be examined too.
At the hospital, doctors confirmed what he feared.
The babies were dehydrated and underfed but stable.
Ellie was exhausted, mildly malnourished, and dangerously sleep-deprived.
"When did you last sleep through the night?" Nathan asked.
She shrugged.
"Before Mom died."
That night, a temporary family placement was located that could take all three children together.
Nathan drove behind the social worker's vehicle.
He told himself he was simply ensuring they arrived safely.
He knew that wasn't true.
At the foster home, Ellie stood at the doorway.
A woman named Grace welcomed her.
There were clean beds.
Heat.
Baby supplies.
Food.
Ellie still wouldn't enter.
Nathan crouched beside her.
"What's wrong?"
"Are you leaving?"
The question caught him completely unprepared.
"I..."
Of course he was leaving.
He had meetings.
A company.
A life.
Ellie's expression closed before he answered.
"Okay."
She stepped inside.
Nathan watched her walk away.
He hated the relief in her voice because it wasn't relief.
It was resignation.
She had expected him to disappear.
Everyone did.
Nathan drove home.
At 2:13 a.m., he was still awake.
At 2:47, he opened his laptop.
At 3:05, he searched the regulations governing foster advocacy.
At 4:30, he emailed his attorney.
At 6:00, his assistant found him sitting in the kitchen wearing yesterday's clothes.
"You missed dinner."
"I know."
"You missed the investor call."
"I know."
"Should I ask why?"
Nathan stared at twenty-seven cents sitting on his kitchen counter.
Ellie had accidentally dropped the napkin in his car.
He had found it after leaving.
A quarter.
Two pennies.
"No," he said.
"Not yet."
At nine that morning, he returned to Grace's house.
Ellie opened the door.
Her eyes widened.
"You came back."
Nathan held up the folded napkin.
"You forgot something."
She looked at the coins.
Then at him.
"You could've kept them."
Nathan smiled.
"You told me you'd repay me when you grow up."
For the first time, Ellie laughed.
It lasted less than two seconds.
But Nathan knew immediately he wanted to hear it again.
May you like
He couldn't have known that somebody else was already looking for Ellie.
And unlike Nathan, that person wasn't interested in helping her.
