Chapter 2 - The Woman in the Photograph
The wedding was canceled.
Daniel didn't postpone it.
He canceled it.
Claire left the ballroom furious, humiliated and frightened.
Daniel noticed frightened most.
That bothered him.
Emma and Lily were taken upstairs to a private bridal suite with Daniel and a pediatric nurse who happened to be among the guests.
Both girls were physically safe.
Only then did Daniel ask questions.
“Who gave you the locket?”
Emma looked at Phoebe.
Phoebe shook her head slightly.
Daniel saw it.
“Don't do that.”
Phoebe frowned.
“Do what?”
“Decide what my daughter can tell me.”
Emma whispered:
“Mom gave it to me.”
Daniel froze.
Emma’s mother, Rebecca, had died four years earlier.
Car accident.
No mystery.
No suspicious circumstances.
Daniel had buried her himself.
“When?”
“Before she died.”
“Why didn't you show me?”
“She told me not to.”
Until when?
Emma remembered Rebecca’s exact words:
When Daddy chooses another wife, look at the woman. If she recognizes the locket, don't let him marry her.
Daniel felt the room tilt.
Rebecca had anticipated remarriage?
More importantly—
Claire had recognized it.
Daniel turned toward Phoebe.
“What is this?”
Phoebe asked to see the photograph.
She studied it.
“You know the woman?”
“No.”
“You told Emma not to read the engraving.”
“I know the engraving may identify someone.”
“Who?”
Phoebe refused.
Not because she wanted secrecy.
Because she had never seen the original locket.
Rebecca had described it once.
That was all.
Daniel inspected photograph.
The younger version of himself was unmistakable.
He remembered St. Matthew’s.
He had visited his sister Rachel after a difficult delivery there twelve years ago.
Was the baby Rachel’s son?
No.
Rachel’s son was born at another hospital.
Then Daniel remembered volunteering at a Mercer Foundation neonatal event.
Could photograph be from that?
Possible.
But why would Rebecca hide it?
Then Emma said:
“There's another picture.”
Everyone turned.
She had found the locket inside an old sewing box Rebecca left with Emma’s grandmother, Margaret Hayes.
Three days ago Margaret died.
Emma was allowed to choose one keepsake.
She chose sewing box.
Inside:
Locket.
Photograph.
And a note.
Emma had left note at Margaret’s house.
Daniel sent Phoebe to retrieve it.
Claire called seventeen times.
He ignored every call.
Then message:
DANIEL, PLEASE. THAT LOCKET IS NOT WHAT YOU THINK.
Interesting.
He hadn't told Claire what he thought.
Another:
ASK PHOEBE ABOUT ST. MATTHEW’S.
Daniel showed Phoebe.
Her face changed.
“What happened there?”
Phoebe sat.
“Rebecca asked me to investigate a sealed birth record.”
“Whose?”
“She never told me.”
“When?”
“Six months before she died.”
Daniel stared.
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“She instructed me not to unless certain conditions occurred.”
“Like my wedding?”
“No.”
Phoebe looked toward Emma.
“Like that locket returning.”
Then she explained something Daniel had never known.
Rebecca had worked at St. Matthew’s before their marriage.
Not as nurse.
Administrative compliance.
During an audit, she discovered several maternity records from one particular night had been altered.
Twelve years ago.
The night photograph was taken.
Daniel looked again.
“What does this have to do with Claire?”
“I don't know.”
But Claire knew hospital name.
That meant something.
Then Phoebe returned with Rebecca’s note.
Daniel opened it.
Three lines:
Emma,
If the woman recognizes the gold, trust her fear before you trust her explanation.
The photograph lies.
The inscription does not.
Daniel turned locket over.
Emma’s thumb no longer covered engraving.
He almost read it.
Phoebe stopped him.
“Wait.”
“Why?”
She had found something else in sewing box.
A folded hospital bracelet.
Newborn female.
St. Matthew’s.
Same date as photograph.
But the mother’s name had been deliberately cut away.
And where the baby’s name should have been—
May you like
someone had written only one letter.
C.
