Chapter 9 - Angela’s Daughter
Angela stood so quickly her chair fell backward.
“No.”
Sarah didn't move.
“Angela—”
“I never had a baby.”
Sarah looked devastated.
“Yes, you did.”
Angela was eighteen.
College freshman.
She remembered becoming sick after a party.
Then weeks of confusion.
A pregnancy.
She told Thomas.
Thomas handled everything.
Angela carried the baby privately while taking a semester away under the explanation that she had mononucleosis.
That part she remembered.
What she denied was the child surviving.
“I had a stillbirth.”
Sarah shook her head.
“You were told you did.”
Angela started crying.
The baby was born alive.
A girl.
Thomas arranged an adoption without allowing Angela to see her.
He told Angela the infant died from complications because he believed that would make separation easier.
A monstrous decision disguised as mercy.
Sarah learned years later.
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Dad made me believe the baby went to a safe family.”
“That isn't an answer!”
“No.”
Sarah accepted it.
“I was a coward.”
The adoption was processed through the foundation's network.
Records were sealed.
Then something went wrong.
The intended adoptive parents never received the baby.
The child's identity disappeared.
Rachel Monroe found a reference while investigating her own relocation file.
She contacted Sarah.
Then Rachel died before learning more.
Dad sat down.
“So Rachel was investigating Angela's daughter?”
“Yes.”
That meant my mother and future stepmother were connected before Angela ever married Dad.
Angela looked sick.
“Did Daniel know?”
“No.”
“Did Rachel?”
“She knew the mother's first name was Angela. Nothing else.”
Then I understood something.
“Is that why you married Dad?”
Angela looked at me.
“No.”
“Did you know Rachel had searched for your daughter?”
“Not until after Daniel and I were already dating.”
That distinction mattered.
Again, their relationship wasn't secretly engineered from the beginning.
But Angela discovered the connection before marrying Dad and hid it.
Another lie.
Then investigators found the missing adoption reference.
Baby Girl Harcourt.
Born May 14, 2003.
Mother: Angela Harcourt.
Father field blank.
Placement coordinator:
Evelyn Mercer.
Everyone looked at Grandma.
Angela whispered:
“You took my baby?”
Evelyn shook her head.
“I placed her.”
“Where?”
“With the family Thomas selected.”
“Who?”
Evelyn couldn't remember the surname.
The record had been altered afterward.
But she remembered one thing.
The adoptive mother was a foundation employee.
Claire suddenly went pale.
“No.”
Dad looked at her.
“What?”
Claire sat down.
“I know who took her.”
In 2003, Claire had a coworker who suddenly left the bookkeeping office.
A woman named Melissa Grant.
Melissa returned months later with a newborn girl she said she had adopted privately.
Then Melissa disappeared from Claire's life.
Sarah searched the relocation database.
Melissa Grant had later changed her name.
Current name:
Karen Bishop.
Everyone became silent.
Karen.
One of Angela's four friends at the campout.
The woman who had laughed:
“You didn't bring a stepdaughter. You brought a maid.”
Angela stared at Sarah.
“No.”
Karen had been Angela's friend for nine years.
They met at a yoga studio.
At least that was the story.
Karen had known exactly who Angela was before approaching her.
Then Angela remembered something.
Karen had a daughter.
Twenty-three years old.
Away at graduate school.
Name:
Sophie.
Angela's knees buckled.
“My God.”
Sarah said:
“We need DNA before anyone tells that girl anything.”
Correct.
Documents had lied too often.
No one was going to destroy a young woman's identity based on old paperwork.
Angela called Karen.
No answer.
Again.
Nothing.
Michelle finally answered.
Karen had left the campground immediately after us.
She said there was a family emergency.
Then my phone buzzed.
Another anonymous photograph.
Karen standing beside her SUV.
Beside her was an older man.
Richard Sloan.
My supposedly dead grandfather.
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Underneath:
ASK KAREN WHO SOPHIE'S FATHER IS.
