Chapter 3 - RUBY’S MOTHERI called Rebecca Hayes myself.
She answered on the first ring.
“Sarah?”
Her voice was already breaking.
“Is Ruby with you?”
I closed my eyes.
“No.”
Silence.
Then:
“They told us Chloe died.”
My stomach dropped.
“What?”
Rebecca was at St. Catherine.
The surviving child had severe head trauma and facial swelling.
She had arrived without identification.
No wallet.
No labeled backpack.
No jewelry.
Rebecca had been asked to come because police knew two children were involved.
She had been waiting almost two hours.
“They said the dead child had Chloe’s coat,” she whispered.
I looked at the sealed evidence bag.
“And Ruby’s bracelet.”
Rebecca stopped breathing.
“What?”
“Red beads. Silver moon.”
“Oh God.”
I heard her husband start crying in the background.
The uncertainty suddenly had two families inside it.
Not just mine.
I told Rebecca about the coat.
How Chloe gave it to Ruby.
She remembered.
“Ruby told me Chloe always shares her stuff.”
My throat closed.
Claire arranged for hospital administration, police, and the medical examiner liaison to coordinate formal identification.
No parent running into a morgue.
No dramatic sheet pulled back.
There were procedures.
Dental history.
Medical records.
Distinctive marks.
Photographs where appropriate.
DNA if required.
Truth arrived slowly.
At 1:42 a.m., Claire returned.
Her face told me first.
“The deceased child has a small surgical scar on the lower right abdomen.”
Ruby had her appendix removed at six.
Chloe had never had abdominal surgery.
Rebecca’s husband identified additional details through the appropriate process.
At 2:10 a.m., the medical examiner’s office made the provisional identification.
Ruby Hayes.
I sat on the hospital floor.
I should have felt relief.
Instead I sobbed harder.
A little girl was still dead.
Just not mine.
Mark crouched beside me.
“Sarah.”
I moved away.
“Where’s Chloe?”
The police contacted St. Catherine again.
The surviving child had a small birthmark behind her left ear.
Heart-shaped.
Chloe had one.
I stood so quickly I nearly fainted.
“We’re going.”
Mark stopped me.
“The doctors said she’s in critical condition.”
“I heard them.”
“She may not know us.”
“I heard them.”
“You’re injured.”
“I do not care.”
He lowered his voice.
“We need ten minutes first.”
I stared.
“For what?”
“Legal needs the release finalized.”
I thought I had misheard him.
“Our daughter is alive.”
“And the crash still happened.”
“You’re asking me to sign company papers before I see her?”
“It protects us.”
“No.”
“Sarah.”
“No.”
He stood.
His face changed.
Not grief.
Pressure.
“The merger closes tomorrow.”
May you like
And finally he said the thing nobody in that family had dared say plainly.
“If this crash becomes a negligence investigation tonight, six hundred million dollars disappears by morning.”
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