Chapter 2 - WHAT WAS IN HER BLOOD
The paramedic had Claire's wrist in his hand for less than three seconds before his expression changed.
“How did she get these marks?”
Margaret answered before I could.
“She becomes disoriented.”
I turned on her.
“Stop talking for her.”
The paramedic looked between us, then quietly asked Margaret to step away.
She didn't argue.
That frightened me more than another outburst would have.
At the hospital, Claire was taken behind double doors while I sat with Ethan pressed against my chest. He had finally stopped crying, but every few minutes his body jerked as if he still expected another explosion of noise.
Margaret arrived twenty minutes later.
I hadn't invited her.
“You shouldn't be here,” I said.
“I am her family.”
“No. You're my mother.”
Her mouth tightened.
Before she could answer, a nurse called my name.
Claire was awake.
The doctor explained that she had suffered a mild concussion from striking the lower cabinet as she fell. Her wrists showed compression bruising. Nothing was broken.
Then he lowered his voice.
Claire's initial toxicology screen showed benzodiazepines.
I stared at him.
“She doesn't take those.”
Claire turned her face toward me.
“No.”
Margaret, standing near the curtain despite being told to wait outside, spoke immediately.
“I warned you.”
Claire's fingers tightened around the blanket.
“About what?”
Margaret looked at me.
“Daniel, I've seen her taking pills.”
I actually felt my stomach drop.
Because she had told me that before.
Two weeks earlier, Margaret had called while I was at work and said Claire seemed groggy while feeding Ethan. I came home, found Claire asleep on the couch, and later asked whether she was taking anything stronger than her prescribed postpartum pain medication.
The hurt in Claire's face that night had stayed with me.
Now it returned.
“You believed her,” Claire whispered.
I couldn't lie.
“For a while.”
She closed her eyes.
That hurt worse than anger.
The doctor explained the screen wasn't enough to determine which drug, how much, or how it entered Claire's system. A confirmatory blood test had already been ordered.
Margaret folded her arms.
“There. You have your answer.”
“No,” Claire said.
She opened her eyes and looked directly at me.
“Ask her where my phone is.”
Margaret's expression changed by less than an inch.
But I saw it.
I took out my phone and called Claire's number.
Nothing rang in the room.
Nothing rang inside Claire's purse.
Then I remembered the kitchen.
The shattered porcelain.
The chair Margaret had been sitting in.
And her cream leather handbag hanging from the back of it.
A police officer who had responded to the house called me fifteen minutes later.
They had secured the kitchen while documenting the scene.
I asked him to look for Claire's phone.
He found the case beneath the refrigerator.
Empty.
The phone itself was gone.
I looked at Margaret.
She stared back at me.
May you like
Then a vibration came from inside her handbag.
📖 I expected my mother's bag to contain Claire's missing phone, but what the officer found beside it showed someone had been planning for Claire to look unstable. 👇
