Chapter 6 - My husband's second lie
Elmer denied it.
Heather produced messages.
Three weeks earlier:
ELMER: Dad's getting suspicious again.
LYDIA: We need another sample.
ELMER: Joanna will notice if you cut her hair.
LYDIA: Leave that to me.
I couldn't breathe.
My husband had known.
Maybe not about the cruelty.
But about the plan.
“Why?”
Elmer finally broke.
Because he'd taken a paternity test shortly after Louisa's birth.
He wasn't her biological father.
He hid it because he believed I'd cheated.
For three years, he'd secretly resented me.
Yet never confronted me.
“Why stay?”
“I loved Louisa.”
“And me?”
Silence.
There it was.
Then something unexpected happened.
Elmer handed police his phone voluntarily.
He wanted everything exposed.
His messages revealed Walter had pressured him repeatedly to divorce me and seek custody.
But Elmer refused.
That was why Walter needed another test.
Not to prove Elmer wasn't Louisa's father.
He already knew.
Walter wanted to identify who was.
The family had spent three years hunting Louisa's biological father.
“Why would Walter care?”
Elmer looked at me.
“Because Price told him the sample wasn't random.”
“What does that mean?”
“He said it came from somebody important.”
That sounded absurd.
Until my attorney located one surviving clinic ledger.
My procedure number:
C-4178.
Beside it:
Donor source restricted.
Authorization:
W.M.
Walter Mercer?
No.
The clinic employee explained authorization codes used first and last initials.
W.M. could indeed be Walter Mercer.
Except another handwritten note appeared below it.
Do not disclose to Mercer family.
Someone outside the family had overridden Walter.
May you like
Someone knew exactly whose biological material had been used.
And they'd been protecting that identity for three years.
