Chapter 1 - “Daddy”“Daddy…”
The word landed harder than the hockey stick ever could.
For three seconds, nobody moved.
Not Victoria.
Not Grace.
Not even me.
I stared at the little girl curled beneath Grace’s trembling body, trying to understand how those two syllables could possibly belong to me.
Lily.
Four years old.
Brown eyes.
Small pink sweater.
A tiny silver bracelet around her wrist.
And somehow, the child looking at me as though I were the only safe person left in the world had just called me Daddy.
My throat tightened.
“Lily?”
Her lower lip trembled.
She nodded.
Grace immediately pulled the child closer.
“No.”
It was barely a whisper.
I looked at her.
Blood had begun to seep through the shoulder of her black-and-white uniform. Her face had gone pale, but her eyes were sharp now.
Desperate.
“Grace,” I said slowly, “what did she just call me?”
Grace swallowed.
“She’s confused.”
Victoria jumped in.
“Exactly. She’s terrified. Nathan, you need to listen to me.”
I turned toward my wife.
Victoria's face had recovered just enough color to look human again.
But her eyes gave her away.
Fear.
Pure, naked fear.
That frightened me more than the hockey stick.
“Why was she here?” I asked.
Victoria folded her arms protectively.
“She came into the house with Grace.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“She was sneaking around upstairs.”
“Lily?”
“She was stealing from you.”
I almost laughed.
The ridiculousness of it was so enormous that for a moment I couldn't process it.
A four-year-old was supposedly breaking into my home to steal from me?
Then I saw the safe.
The upstairs safe.
Victoria had mentioned it.
My stomach dropped.
“What exactly was she stealing?”
Victoria hesitated.
That tiny pause told me more than her entire explanation.
“I don’t know,” she said.
“You just said she was stealing.”
“I saw Grace near the office. Lily was there. I assumed…”
“You assumed.”
“Yes.”
I looked at Grace.
She shook her head.
“No, Mr. Mercer.”
Her voice cracked.
“I wasn't stealing anything.”
I crouched beside her.
“Then tell me why she called me Daddy.”
Grace looked at Lily.
Lily looked at me.
And then something happened that made the blood drain from my face.
The little girl lifted her hand.
Her fingers were shaking.
She pointed toward Victoria.
“She said Mommy wasn’t dead.”
Victoria froze.
I slowly stood.
“What?”
Lily's eyes filled again.
“Mommy isn’t dead.”
The kitchen seemed to lose all its air.
Victoria stepped forward.
“She's confused.”
“Victoria.”
My voice was different now.
She stopped.
“Who is Lily’s mother?”
Grace answered before Victoria could.
“Emily.”
My dead sister.
My younger sister Emily had supposedly died eight months ago in a boating accident.
I had attended the funeral.
I had stood beside her coffin.
I had watched Lily disappear into my brother-in-law Ryan’s custody.
And now this child was telling me her mother was alive.
I looked at Victoria.
She stared back at me.
“You're making this into something it isn't.”
Then Lily spoke again.
“Mommy called me last night.”
My heart stopped.
“What did she say?”
Lily hugged herself.
“She said Uncle Nathan would find me.”
Victoria suddenly lunged toward her.
Grace screamed.
I stepped between them.
“Don't.”
Victoria stopped.
For the first time in eight years of marriage, my wife looked at me as though I were a stranger.
Then my phone rang.
The screen showed one word.
UNKNOWN.
I answered.
Silence.
Then a woman's trembling voice whispered:
“Nathan…”
I knew that voice.
My knees nearly gave out.
“Emily?”
A breath.
A sob.
Then three words.
“Your wife knows.”
The line went dead.
And behind me, Victoria whispered:
“Don't listen to her.”
I turned.
Her face had become completely white.
Because she knew exactly who had just called me.
And that meant one impossible thing.
My sister wasn't dead.
May you like
She was alive.
And my wife had been lying to me for eight months.
