Chapter 2 - The Forty-Eight Hours Claire Never Explained
Daniel took Lily back to the resort suite himself.
Vanessa did not come with them.
Neither did Claire.
Daniel’s older brother stayed with Lily while Daniel returned downstairs to a private lounge with Claire.
The wedding continued two floors below.
Music.
Glasses.
People laughing.
Daniel could barely hear any of it.
“Start talking.”
Claire sat opposite him.
“Emma didn’t just leave your house.”
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
“I know that.”
“No. You know what happened after she left.”
“What does that mean?”
Claire stared at her hands.
Three years earlier, Emma had been struggling badly.
Postpartum depression had begun after Lily’s birth.
Then insomnia.
Panic attacks.
Periods when she barely ate.
She became frightened of being alone with Lily because she was terrified she would fail her.
Daniel remembered.
He also remembered fights.
Too many.
Claire continued.
“The night she disappeared, she called me.”
Daniel stopped.
“You told me she didn’t.”
“I lied.”
He stood so abruptly the chair scraped backward.
“You stood in my kitchen while I called hospitals.”
“I know.”
“Police.”
“I know.”
“I thought she might be dead.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying that.”
Claire flinched.
Daniel forced himself to sit.
“What did she want?”
“She wanted help.”
Claire had driven Emma to a residential mental-health program in Vermont.
Not a secret institution.
Not a fake identity.
A licensed treatment center specializing in postpartum psychiatric care.
Emma begged Claire not to tell Daniel for forty-eight hours.
“She thought you’d come get her.”
“I would have.”
“That was exactly what she was afraid of.”
Daniel stared.
“Afraid of me?”
“Afraid she would see you and leave treatment before anybody could help her.”
Daniel remembered the last fight.
Emma crying.
Daniel telling her they could not keep living like this.
Emma screaming that everybody thought she was dangerous.
Daniel had grabbed his keys and walked outside rather than continue.
By morning, she was gone.
“You let me think she abandoned Lily.”
“For two days.”
“Three years, Claire.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“She left the facility on the second night.”
Daniel stared at her.
“What?”
“She signed herself out.”
“Where did she go?”
“I didn’t know.”
“You’re lying again.”
“No.”
Claire looked at him.
“That part is true.”
Daniel stood.
“Why didn’t you tell me then?”
“Because I had already hidden where she was.”
“So?”
“I panicked.”
Daniel laughed bitterly.
“You panicked?”
“I thought if I told you, you’d never forgive me.”
“You were right.”
Claire absorbed it.
Daniel walked toward the door.
Then stopped.
“Vanessa knew.”
Claire’s expression shifted.
“Yes.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
Daniel turned back.
“That’s another lie.”
“It isn’t.”
“Then why did she know enough to say what she said tonight?”
Claire hesitated.
Only briefly.
May you like
Daniel caught it anyway.
There was still more.
