That hit him harder than the scene did. He looked at the sticker on her sleeve and closed his eyes for one second.
“Yes,” he said.
The room got very still.
He opened them again fast, like the truth might change if he moved quickly enough. “She called while you were in recovery,” he said. “She said she wanted to apologize. She said she’d bring soup and flowers, stay five minutes, and leave. I told the desk to let her up once. That’s all.”
Vivian cut in. “I came to protect this family.”
“Protect it from what?” I asked. “A mother keeping her own child?”
Evan looked like I had slapped him. Maybe I had. Just not with my hand.
Ruiz asked him to step into the hall for a statement. Evan refused. “I’m staying with my wife,” he said.
“Then answer in front of her,” Ruiz said.
That was the moment I understood why I had hidden so much of myself from the Sterlings. They loved power as long as it wore their last name. The second it answered to law, truth, or anyone else, they called it disrespect.
Evan swallowed hard. “I did not know about any papers,” he said. “I did not know she was going to touch the babies. I did not know she’d do this.”
I believed half of that immediately. The other half took longer.
Because not knowing the exact crime doesn’t erase opening the door.
The social worker asked whether there had ever been prior discussion of family adoption. I said yes, once, in the abstract. After Brooke’s third failed IVF cycle, Vivian had started talking about “legacy” at dinner.
Always over dessert. Always like she was discussing estate planning.
I had told Evan the conversation made my skin crawl. He told me his mother was grieving and didn’t mean it literally.
