Chapter 12 - The Schedule
The schedule listed dates, meals, and doses.
Not full doses.
Tiny amounts.
Enough, according to the toxicologist, to make a child sleepy, clumsy, or confused without necessarily sending her to the hospital.
The dates matched incidents Margaret had written in her notebook.
Claire failed to supervise.
Ellie unusually tired.
Claire distracted during fall.
Claire allowed child to become ill.
They had not just collected evidence against me.
They had manufactured it through my daughter’s body.
I had to leave the room when Ramirez explained that.
In the hallway, I pressed both hands against the wall and tried not to scream.
Daniel followed.
“Don’t,” I said.
“I’m sorry.”
“Do not give me that word.”
“I didn’t know about the drugs.”
“But you made it possible.”
He had no answer.
Vanessa was arrested that afternoon on charges connected to forgery, child endangerment, and controlled-substance possession while investigators worked on the larger case.
Margaret’s attorney called the schedule “fabricated evidence planted by a disgruntled employee.”
Then Rick Dalton disappeared.
Police found his truck abandoned near the interstate.
Inside were gloves, camera equipment, and a folder containing pictures of me.
One photo showed me leaving work.
Another showed Ellie at school.
A third showed my mother taking out the trash.
The last photograph was different.
It showed Daniel outside a motel, kissing a woman I had never seen.
The date was eight months earlier.
I stared at it for a long time.
Daniel looked sick.
“Claire—”
I handed the picture back.
“Not now.”
“It ended months ago.”
“Not now.”
“I swear it had nothing to do with—”
I snapped.
“Nothing to do with what? The forged documents? The drugs? The surveillance? Your mother trying to steal our child? Pick a disaster, Daniel. I’m running out of room.”
Ellie called for me from the bedroom.
I turned away from him.
Then Ramirez appeared at the end of the hallway.
“We found Rick,” he said.
“Where?”
“In custody.”
“Did he talk?”
May you like
Ramirez nodded.
“And he says Margaret paid him to arrange an accident for you.”
