Chapter 1 - the baby on my sister’s bed
“Starting tomorrow, we’re going to tell everyone that baby is yours.”
My mother said it with the same calm voice she used when asking someone to stop at the grocery store on the way home.
I was standing in Astrid’s room with my backpack still slung over one shoulder, staring at the newborn sleeping in the middle of her bed. He was wrapped in a blue blanket from the Scottsdale clinic, his tiny mouth opening now and then in a dream, his fists tucked beneath his chin as if the world had never done anything cruel to anyone.
But the world had already done something cruel to him.
It had given him my family.
Astrid had delivered him the previous afternoon at a private clinic in Scottsdale. Before dawn, she had packed a suitcase, kissed the baby once according to my mother, and left for London. The official story was dazzling enough to sound respectable: a scholarship, a business program, a rare opportunity, a future too important to miss.
The real story was sitting in front of me in a borrowed bassinet.
“Are you insane?” I asked. “That baby is not mine.”
My mother, Beatrice, stepped forward and seized my wrist so hard her nails bit into my skin. “Astrid cannot ruin her life over one mistake. You can take a break from school. Tell people you hid the pregnancy. Raise him quietly.”
My father stood in the doorway, hands buried in his pockets, looking everywhere except at me.
“What about my life?” I asked.
My mother sighed, irritated that I was making this harder than necessary. “Elsie, don’t be childish. Astrid has always been the one with ambition. You’re practical. You’ll adapt.”
That sentence hit with the old familiar sting. Astrid received tutors, summer programs, new dresses, and smiling encouragement. I received leftovers, explanations, and reminders that some daughters were investments while others were insurance policies.
I looked at the baby again.
“Who’s the father?”
My mother’s face changed instantly. The softness vanished. “That doesn’t concern you.”
Which told me, of course, that it concerned me completely.
That night, after my parents finally went to sleep, I searched Astrid’s room. I found the phone inside the side pocket of her maternity bag, tucked beneath an unopened pack of newborn diapers. A second phone. No passcode.
My pulse picked up as I opened it.
There were dozens of messages from a contact saved only as D.R.
I clicked the thread.
If it’s a boy, your trust changes. I’ve already read the clauses.
That was Astrid.
A few messages later, the reply came back:
Stop accessing files that aren’t meant for you.
I stared at the contact photo until my throat went dry.
Dennis Roth.
The CEO of Roth Capital Group. Thirty-two years old. Ice-cold in interviews. Heir to one of the most powerful business families in the country.
Then I scrolled to the next message from Astrid:
When you realize what this baby really means, you’ll be the one looking for me.
I looked over at the newborn sleeping in the half-dark.
My parents weren’t trying to give me a child out of desperation.
They were trying to hand me a secret.
And somewhere inside that secret was a reason my sister had fled the country before sunrise.
At the bottom of the phone, there was one unsent draft.
May you like
It contained only six words.
If anything happens, trust Elsie.
