Jasper toddles around me, peering inside.
“Dada,” he calls, confused by his father’s absence. I manage to lug Opal’s car seat into the living room, placing it beside the couch. Tessa shuts the door and sets the alarm. She surveys the banner Gabe’s hung, the counter he’s covered in food. I can’t tell if she’s hoping to find Gabe, too, or if it’s starting to sink in just how difficult this is going to be without him. I’m here now, but I can’t stay forever, not even if Tessa lets me be a part of their lives.
“He’s not here,” I tell her.
Tessa nods distractedly. I help her to the couch, ask her if she wants some ice for her incision. She shakes her head no and motions to the bassinet in the corner, asking me to wheel it over beside the couch, where she grunts as she bends over to lift Opal out of the car seat and into the bed. When I start to help, she shakes her head no again. As painful as it is, as much as her body still has to heal, Tessa wants to do this on her own. Despite Tessa’s clunky movements, Opal doesn’t wake. She keeps her lids closed tight against this uncertain world. Outside, the man who walks his two Yorkies rushes by. Across the canal, I lock eyes with the man who pushes his bike, the child’s seat still empty.You’re a father,I commune to him over the waterless basin.Protect her.He scratches his beard as we breathe each other in. In our contact, I hear him promise that he will.
The house phone rings. Gabe’s name blinks on the caller ID. Tessa shakes her head no yet again, and we let it go to voicemail. He calls four times before getting the hint.
Jasper and I roll a ball back and forth on the floor as Tessa rests on the couch. I can tell from her steady breathing that she isn’t sleeping; that, as still as she is, her mind is racing. Suddenly, the room reeks of excrement, but not the yeasty odor of baby poop, which, even after all these years, I can still recall in an instant. Jasper points to his bottom and shouts, “Poo. Poo.”
Tessa sits up, shifts her focus between Jasper and the staircase, dismayed. It’s been years since I’ve changed a diaper, but like the memory of baby poop, it’s something that never leaves you. I offer to change his diaper, knowing not to read too much into it when Tessa tells me it would be a big help.
When we return downstairs, Tessa is now upright on the couch, reading the sheets of paper with the women’s names. Jasper races across the room, lunging for a bag. I help him dump out dozens of colorful plastic shapes, their magnetic edges gravitating toward each other and locking into place. I make my way across the room to sit beside her. Thanks to my career, I’ve had a lot of experience offering advice thatpeople don’t want to hear, circumventing the truth rather than plowing right through it.
“I know you want to do the right thing. You just got home. Let your body heal. Let yourself adjust to the change. This information will still be here when you’re ready.”
Tessa nods, skimming one page, flipping to the next. “So many of my friends are on this list.”
In the hospital, it had surprised me when Tessa said she’d start with the women she knew, that Gabe could do this to people he’d met for dinners and playdates. Nothe.Them.If Tessa is the one to call, to expose the truth, the mothers will blame her as much as they blame Gabe. They’ll ostracize her, shun her like her neighbor friend has. Though we need evidence to bring to Officer Gonzales, she can’t call them. She can’t do this to the mothers. She can’t do this to herself either.
I try a different tactic. “See here.” I point to the names with asterisks. “We don’t know which ones were—” The words are too horrifying to vocalize. “We’ll unnecessarily scare some of these mothers if we reach out to them now. We need more information. We need to come up with a plan.”
“When this breaks, they’re all going to be terrified that it happened to them. Everyone in their life is going to ask, ‘Isn’t that the clinic you went to?’ At least this way, they’ll know first, have time to cope.”
It’s become a foregone conclusion that this will break. That doesn’t mean Tessa needs to be the one to crack it open.
“I can’t keep Gabe’s secret,” Tessa insists.
“Let’s not decide anything now.” I gingerly reach over and take the list from her hands. I fold it and return it to the counter. “We’ll make a plan. Trust me, you don’t want to do something this big without thinking it through first.”
I haven’t told her about Jessica, my missteps at work. I haven’t wanted her to see me the way Jessica did, as an old lady who confuses meddling for helping. I don’t want to tell her now, but I will, if it will help her make a better choice than I did.
“You’re right.” Tessa lies back on the couch and drapes her arm across her face.
A loud crash jolts Tessa upright again, and she scans the room, expecting disaster. It’s only Jasper, throwing the plastic pieces against the wall. Tessa winces from the sudden movement, shuddering each time the plastic thumps.
My knees crack as I stand. “What would you say to me and Jasper taking a little trip to the park?”
Opal’s asleep in her bassinet. Tessa could use this time to rest, restore, regroup.
At the sound ofpark, Jasper is already standing, shouting, “Par. Par.”
He waddles over and reaches for my hand. Again, I remind myself not to read more into this than what it is: an adult willing to give him what he wants, a nod from his tired mother, who could use a moment to herself. We all need to exhibit patience right now. Me, in defining my relationship with Jasper. Tessa, in contacting the mothers. Jasper, in tugging my hand to get to the park.
When Tessa locks the French doors behind us and stumbles over to the entryway to set the alarm, I’m reminded that we all can’t wait too long. Everything’s calm for now, but my daughter’s murderer is out there somewhere. Someone who might know the truth. Someone who has already killed a second time. Someone who has no reason to be patient.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Tessa
After I set the alarm, I lie back down on the couch, trying to decide whether this makes me safe. Over the last seventy-two hours, I’ve uncovered more truths than I could have imagined. Yet I’ve learned nothing about who might be after Gabe, or who killed Regina and Aram. The alarm countdown ends, beeping to indicate it’s set. Despite its security, I remain on edge.
With Jasper and Barb gone, Opal’s shallow breathing fills the house. Conversations from tourists waft in. Two women speedwalk by, talking about a date. “They were fashion sweatpants, but still. On a first date?” one woman says. “Next!” her friend rejoices, glancing at me as they walk past. A couple—neither of them can be more than twenty years old—stop at my bougainvillea and lean into each other for a selfie. They don’t notice me until after they’ve taken the picture, and the girl mouths, “Sorry.” I nod that it’s fine as she tugs her boyfriend out of view. I’m jealous of their voyeurism, so comfortable in their lives that they can envy someone else’s. I’ve never felt more in a fishbowl, more like a sitting duck—all the animalistic clichés—than I do now. Their presence doesn’t make me feel safe either. It never did.
Barb is right. I don’t have a plan. I can’t just call one of my clients and say,Hey, we haven’t talked since I made those earrings for your anniversary, but you should know, my husband implanted you with another woman’s egg. Oh, and I had the baby, so I’ll be back to work in no time. Don’t be a stranger.I hear how this sounds. And it won’t be the same as it was telling Barb. With Barb, it was enriching. A gift. With the other mothers, I’ll be taking something from them, something they don’t know they could lose. Still, I can’t just sit here waiting for my body to heal, hoping the killer won’t come for us. Maybe, if the mothers know, if the truth’s exposed and Gabe’s prosecuted for his crimes, the killer will have no reason to strike. My body isn’t capable of much right now. It can call the mothers. It’s the only thing I can think to do that might protect us.
I shuffle over to the counter to get the list, to the front door, where my phone’s somewhere at the bottom of my purse, then back to the couch. I cradle the phone against my chest as I craft a short script. I can picture Barb’s patient face cautioning me, but I need to get the truth out. I physically can’t hold on to it anymore. And I only need one woman to believe me. One woman to send her child’s DNA for testing. One person to make this whole house of cards come crashing down.
