Chapter 7 - The Baby With Daniel’s Name
St. Vincent Women’s Home no longer existed.
The fire had destroyed most of the original building.
A rehabilitation clinic now occupied the property.
But county archives preserved the fire department records.
Detective Cole obtained them before midnight.
Room 214 appeared three times.
One infant male recovered.
One unidentified adult female recovered.
One infant male presumed missing.
That made no sense.
Emma read the report again.
“Two babies?”
Cole nodded.
“Apparently.”
Margaret sat across the interrogation room table at the sheriff’s office.
She had voluntarily agreed to questioning.
Robert was still hospitalized.
Emma should have gone home.
She refused.
“What did you see?” Cole asked Margaret.
Margaret stared at her hands.
“My father took me there after our son died.”
“What date?”
“August seventeenth.”
“Daniel’s birthday.”
“Yes.”
“He brought you to Room 214?”
“Yes.”
“What was inside?”
Margaret swallowed.
“Two bassinets.”
Emma leaned forward.
“Two babies.”
“Yes.”
“Both boys?”
“Yes.”
“One was Daniel?”
Margaret closed her eyes.
“I don’t know.”
Cole stopped writing.
“You don’t know which child you took?”
“My father told me one baby had been abandoned and the other had died.”
“Was the dead child still there?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know there were two?”
“Two bassinets. Two hospital bracelets.”
Emma’s pulse raced.
“What names?”
Margaret looked at her.
“One said Baby Carter.”
Emma gripped the table.
“And the other?”
Margaret hesitated.
“Baby Hayes.”
Silence.
Emma whispered, “Your biological son.”
“Yes.”
“But you said he died at another hospital.”
“He did.”
“Then why would his bracelet be at St. Vincent?”
Margaret began crying.
“That is what I never understood.”
Cole looked at Emma.
Margaret continued.
“My father said the records needed to match. I thought he had moved the bracelet to create paperwork for Daniel.”
“You accepted that?”
“I had buried my child that morning.”
Her voice broke.
“I wasn’t thinking like a detective.”
Emma almost felt sympathy again.
Almost.
Then she remembered the barn photographs.
“Why were you tracking my pregnancy?”
Margaret’s tears stopped.
“I wasn’t.”
Emma placed photographs from the barn on the table.
“Those cameras didn’t install themselves.”
Margaret stared.
“That was not my barn.”
“You control the trust that owns it.”
“I haven’t used that barn in years.”
Cole leaned forward.
“Your GPS places you there.”
“I went looking for Daniel.”
“Four times before he disappeared?”
Margaret froze.
That was the mistake.
Emma saw it.
Cole saw it.
Margaret corrected herself.
“I meant before you reported him missing.”
Emma’s voice became quiet.
“You knew he was going to disappear.”
Margaret stood.
“I’m done.”
Cole said, “Sit down.”
“I came voluntarily.”
The door opened.
A deputy entered.
He whispered something to Cole.
The detective’s expression hardened.
“What?”
Emma asked.
Cole looked at Margaret.
“We identified the second blood sample from Daniel’s truck.”
Margaret stared at him.
“Whose?”
“Rachel Wynn.”
Emma remembered the woman from the barn file.
Daniel’s former girlfriend.
The secondary candidate.
“Is she alive?” Emma asked.
Cole hesitated.
“We don’t know.”
Margaret closed her eyes.
Emma stood.
“You know something.”
Margaret remained silent.
“Why was Rachel’s blood in Daniel’s truck?”
Nothing.
Emma walked around the table.
“What did you do to her?”
Margaret looked up sharply.
“I did nothing.”
“Then where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
Cole’s phone rang.
He answered.
His expression changed.
“Where?”
He looked through the glass toward the hallway.
“Lock the building.”
Emma’s heart raced.
“What happened?”
Cole ended the call.
“The deputy watching the south property found someone inside the barn.”
“Who?”
“A woman.”
Emma barely breathed.
“Rachel?”
“No.”
Cole looked at Margaret.
“An elderly woman.”
Margaret stood slowly.
May you like
Cole continued.
“She claims her name is Evelyn Carter.”
