Chapter 3
CHAPTER 3 — The Call
I stepped into the hallway and closed the door softly behind me.
The doctor followed.
Her name was Dr. Elaine Mercer.
She held a clipboard against her chest, but her eyes were fixed on mine.
“Mr. Carter,” she said, “we’ve documented everything medically. His statements have also been recorded through proper channels. Child protective services has been contacted.”
I nodded.
“Good.”
She hesitated.
“There’s something else.”
I looked at her.
“Your son said his mother was present at the house.”
The hallway seemed to tilt.
“Present?”
“He said she told him to apologize.”
For a moment, all I could hear was the monitor beeping inside Jake’s room.
Christine.
My wife.
Jake’s mother.
The woman who used to sleep with her hand on his crib when he had a fever.
The woman who packed his lunch with little notes folded inside.
Present.
I looked at my phone again.
Eight missed calls from her now.
Maybe guilt.
Maybe panic.
Maybe her father had finally told her what to say.
I answered the next call.
Christine’s voice came through immediately.
“Daniel, where are you?”
“At the hospital.”
She started crying.
“Dad said Jake fell. He said it was an accident.”
I closed my eyes.
“Were you there?”
Silence.
That silence said more than any confession.
“Christine.”
“I was inside,” she whispered. “I didn’t see everything.”
“Did Jake ask for me?”
Another silence.
Then, smaller, “Yes.”
“And your father told him I wasn’t coming?”
She sobbed.
“Daniel, please don’t do anything crazy.”
That almost made me laugh.
Crazy.
As if telling the truth was chaos.
As if protecting my child was overreacting.
As if the real danger was what I might do, not what they had already done.
I kept my voice low.
“I am going to do exactly what should have been done the moment Jake was hurt.”
“Daniel—”
“Do not go back to your father’s house. Do not warn him. Do not delete anything. And do not ask me to protect grown men who frightened my son.”
I ended the call.
Then I made another.
Not to some shadowy contact.
Not to violence.
Not to revenge.
To the district attorney I had worked with years ago when I was still a federal investigator before I left that life for a quieter one.
He answered on the third ring.
“Carter?”
“I need detectives sent to Brentwood,” I said.
His voice changed.
“What happened?”
I looked through the glass at Jake resting in the bed, still holding the stuffed bear a nurse had given him.
“My son is in the hospital,” I said. “And the men responsible think my name won’t matter.”
There was a short silence.
May you like
Then he said, “Send me the address.”
I did.
