Chapter 9 - The Anonymous LetterClara did not sleep.
She sat in the rocking chair beside Noah’s bed until dawn painted the curtains gray.
Every time the boy moved, her body reacted before her mind did.
A mother’s reflex returning from exile.
Alexander came at sunrise with coffee he had made himself.
Badly.
Clara looked at the cup.
“Did you poison this?”
His mouth almost curved.
“If I did, I used too much sugar.”
She took it anyway.
For a moment, they were almost the people they had been before money and mothers and forged papers destroyed them.
Then Clara reached into her apron pocket.
“There’s something I need to tell you.”
Alexander sat across from her.
She handed him a folded piece of paper.
No envelope.
No signature.
Only six words typed in the center.
Your son is not safe there.
Alexander read it twice.
“When did you get this?”
“Ten months ago.”
“Before you applied here.”
She nodded.
“It was slipped under my apartment door. No return address. Nothing on the cameras.”
Alexander’s expression changed.
“You came because you thought Noah was in danger.”
“I came because I thought my dead son might be alive and unsafe.”
He looked toward the bed.
Noah slept with one hand under his cheek.
“Why didn’t you tell me last night?”
Clara’s laugh was quiet and exhausted.
“Between your mother stealing my baby and your fiancée calling me staff, it slipped down the list.”
He accepted that.
“Do you still think he’s in danger?”
Clara looked at the letter.
“Yes.”
Alexander did not dismiss it.
That mattered.
“From Vivienne?”
“Maybe. Maybe your mother. Maybe someone else.”
“Someone else?”
Clara hesitated.
“The night I first got access to the nursery, Noah had a fever. The nurse couldn’t calm him. I wasn’t supposed to touch him, but he kept crying. So I held him.”
Alexander listened carefully.
“He stopped crying immediately,” Clara said. “The nurse looked terrified, not angry. She said, ‘He knows you.’ Then she told me to leave before Mrs. Blackwood found out.”
“What happened to that nurse?”
“Gone the next morning.”
Alexander stood.
“What was her name?”
“Marisol.”
He called Daniel immediately.
“Find every record of a night nurse named Marisol employed here in the last year. Payroll, agency, phone number, address.”
Then he looked back at Clara.
“What else?”
She hesitated.
“Noah has nightmares.”
Alexander’s face softened.
“I know.”
“No. Not normal nightmares. He says the lady in white locks doors.”
Alexander’s hand tightened around the phone.
“Vivienne?”
“I don’t know. Children mix things up.”
But they both knew children also remembered things adults prayed they wouldn’t.
Noah woke then, blinking.
He saw Clara and smiled.
It was small.
Sleepy.
Trusting.
“Mommy.”
Clara moved to him immediately.
Alexander watched the way Noah touched her face, as if confirming she was real.
Then Noah looked at Alexander.
“Daddy.”
Alexander stepped closer.
“Morning, buddy.”
Noah held up his stuffed bear.
“Bear says no party today.”
Alexander nodded solemnly.
“Bear is very wise.”
Clara smiled despite herself.
For a fragile moment, the room was peaceful.
Then shouting erupted downstairs.
Daniel appeared at the door.
“Sir.”
Alexander turned.
“What happened?”
Daniel’s face was grim.
“Marisol was found.”
Clara stood.
“Where is she?”
“At the gate.”
May you like
His voice lowered.
“She says she’ll only speak to Clara.”
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