Chapter 5 - The Price of a Daughter
June spent six days in the special-care nursery.
Six days measured in small improvements.
Breathing more comfortably.
Holding her temperature.
Taking more milk.
Wren learned the shape of her daughter’s ears, the fierce concentration of her sleeping face, and the way one tiny finger curled around hers.
Declan learned to ask the nurses what he could do.
Then he did it.
He washed his hands until his skin cracked.
He brought Wren food she sometimes forgot to eat.
He accepted instructions without offering money as though money were a substitute for competence.
Once, a nurse corrected the way he supported June’s head.
He said thank you.
Wren watched from the chair beside them.
It should not have felt extraordinary.
She knew that.
It still did.
On the fourth day, Victor called.
Not Wren.
Declan.
He stepped into the corridor to answer, then returned and told her immediately.
That was new.
“What did he say?”
Declan looked at Amelia, who had been reviewing paperwork at the small table.
“He wants a meeting.”
“About?”
“Documents. Shares. Access to company accounts.”
“And June?”
Declan’s expression hardened.
“He said fatherhood clarifies a man’s priorities.”
Wren held her daughter closer.
Amelia set down her pen.
“Preserve the communication. No private arrangements.”
Declan nodded.
Wren studied him.
“Would you have made one before?”
“Yes.”
The answer came without hesitation.
“Would you have told me?”
“No.”
Her throat tightened.
He looked at June.
“I’m telling you now.”
It was not enough to erase what came before.
It was enough to keep her listening.
The next morning, a woman arrived carrying a white gift bag.
She gave the desk a name Wren recognized.
Maeve Rourke.
Declan’s younger sister.
Wren had liked Maeve once.
She was twenty-four, sharp-tongued, funny, and the only member of the family who had ever asked whether Wren found their dinners exhausting.
Hospital staff called before allowing her anywhere near the room.
Wren agreed to see her with Amelia present.
Maeve entered looking as though she had not slept.
“I didn’t know about the baby,” she said immediately.
Wren waited.
“I’m not here for him.”
“For which him?”
Maeve flinched.
Fair.
She placed the gift bag on the table.
Inside was not clothing.
It was a small cloth pouch containing a phone.
“Victor used my apartment for meetings while I was in London. I found this in a locked drawer when I came home.”
Amelia did not touch it.
“Have you used it?”
“No. I called Declan’s attorney from my own phone.”
Wren looked at her.
“Why bring it here?”
Maeve’s face crumpled.
“Because the last message on the screen said, The girl delivers in Durango. Confirm the hospital.”
The room seemed to tilt.
Amelia stood.
“We need Agent Ortiz.”
Maeve nodded quickly.
“I know. I just needed Wren to hear that I wasn’t going to pretend this was another family disagreement.”
Wren stared at the pouch.
Another family disagreement.
What a small phrase for a child whose first week of life required armed officers outside the floor.
Declan arrived fifteen minutes later.
When Maeve saw him, she began crying.
“I kept telling myself Uncle Victor was only moving money.”
Declan looked at the phone on the table.
“So did I.”
His sister covered her face.
He did not tell her it was all right.
It wasn’t.
That evening, June fell asleep against Wren’s chest while snow moved beyond the window.
Declan sat across from them.
“My lawyer is finalizing the cooperation agreement,” he said.
“What does it require?”
“Full disclosure. Records. Testimony. No separate deals.”
“And what happens to you?”
He looked at his hands.
“I don’t know the final outcome. There will be consequences for things I did.”
Wren felt an unexpected stab of fear.
Then anger at herself for feeling it.
She could not ask him to become honest and resent the cost of honesty.
“Are you doing this because of June?”
He considered the question.
“She made the future real. But the children in those records existed before I knew about her.”
Wren nodded.
That was the first answer that did not place their daughter in charge of redeeming a grown man.
When June was finally cleared to leave the hospital, Declan carried the empty car seat to the bedside.
He did not pick up the baby.
He waited for Wren.
She fastened June in herself.
Then looked at him.
“We’re not going home with you.”
Pain crossed his face.
He stepped away from the door.
“I know.”
Outside, a protected transport arranged through the authorities waited.
Wren carried her daughter toward it.
May you like
For the first time in eight months, she was not running.
She was choosing where to go.
