Chapter 5 - Not Her Guardian
The officer's name was Dana Ortiz. She looked at the shaken child, the cut ties on the floor, and the blood at the corner of Owen's mouth before she looked at Camille.
"I'd like everyone to stop talking at once," she said.
Camille did not. "Julian is having some kind of episode. This girl came here with a story about a dead woman."
"A story that started with someone tied in a laundry cart," Faye snapped.
Officer Ortiz requested another patrol unit. She listened while Julian explained the ring and while Faye described her abduction. She did not decide, on the strength of a dramatic speech, who should take the child home.
"Who has legal custody?" she asked.
"Her mother," Faye said. "Nora Mercer. I have the emergency contact paperwork in my apartment."
"And Nora is missing?"
"Yes."
Ortiz looked at Sadie. "Is Faye someone you feel safe with?"
Sadie took Faye's hand. "She makes grilled cheese with the burnt part cut off."
"All right." The officer's voice softened. "We'll make sure you two get somewhere safe while we sort out the paperwork."
Camille's eyes flashed. "This is a private event."
"And this is a police investigation," Ortiz replied.
For the first time all evening, Camille said nothing.
Julian accompanied them to an interview room at the station. A detective named Leah Serrano joined them just after midnight. She had a tired face, practical shoes, and an unsettling ability to wait out lies.
"You say Nora Mercer was declared dead," Serrano said. "I pulled the record. There was no positive identification. Just a civil finding after a long absence."
"I know," Julian said. "I attended the hearing."
"Then you know we can reopen it."
Faye spread photocopies across the table: Sadie's birth certificate, school enrollment forms, and an old photograph of Nora holding a newborn. The father's name on the birth certificate was blank.
Julian studied the photograph. Nora looked exhausted, frightened, and gloriously alive.
"She made me promise not to fill that line," Faye said. "She had letters with your signature on them. The kind that make people disappear before a custody fight."
"I didn't write any letters."
"Then find the person who did."
Serrano lifted one more page from Faye's folder. "This was slipped under your door this morning?"
Faye nodded. It was a photograph of Nora taken through the window of a moving car. On the back, someone had written an address.
Julian read it aloud. "Morrow Street, number eighteen."
Serrano looked up sharply. "That's the address of a storage unit we searched in an unrelated fraud case last month."
May you like
She turned the photograph over once more. Beneath the address, in smaller writing, were four words.
SHE KNOWS ABOUT THE WATER.
