Chapter 5 - The File With No Baby Picture
Daniel snatched for the phone, but Emma moved away. “Natalie, where are you?”
“Close enough to see the house. Don't let Victoria know you heard from me.”
Emma lowered her voice. “Is Lily with you?”
“No. But I saw where they planned to move her.” A car horn blared on Natalie's end. “Listen carefully. The adoption file is in the locked cabinet beside Daniel's office. There were two babies in the photograph. One was me.”
The line went dead.
Daniel looked sick. “I don't know what she's talking about.”
“Then help me find out.”
His office smelled of leather, cedar, and the expensive cologne Emma used to love. She crossed the room without looking at the framed wedding portrait. Daniel opened the cabinet with a brass desk key and pulled out a folder marked PRIVATE FAMILY RECORDS.
There were old medical invoices, a sealed court order, and a faded photograph of two infants in matching yellow blankets. On the back Victoria had written: NATALIE / BABY B, 1988.
The office fireplace was cold, but there was fresh ash in its grate. Emma wondered how many letters had burned there while she'd been upstairs reading Lily stories. On Daniel's desk stood a framed photo of their daughter smiling with a missing front tooth. Emma turned the frame toward him.
“Baby B?” Emma asked. “You told me your sister was born alone.”
Daniel unfolded the order. It described a closed adoption finalized before he was old enough to remember. The recipient name had been blacked out in permanent ink, but the hospital stamp was visible: St. Agnes.
Emma found a second document, more recent. A trust transfer authorized that morning. Lily's name appeared under BENEFICIARY; Victoria's under TEMPORARY GUARDIAN. The amount was eighteen million dollars.
“That's why she wants custody,” Emma said. “She wants control of Lily's trust.”
Daniel rubbed his face. “My grandfather left the money to the youngest grandchild, under conditions.”
“Conditions you somehow forgot to tell me about?”
He looked at the floor. “Mother said it would complicate everything.”
A thud came from the ceiling. Then three quick knocks, a pause, and two more. Emma froze. Lily always used that rhythm when she wanted her mother to open a door without waking Daniel.
Three knocks. Pause. Two knocks.
“She's above us,” Emma whispered.
May you like
But the office was beneath the old west-wing nursery, not Lily's bedroom.
CHRISTMAS EVE BETRAYAL • THE MISSING DAUGHTER
