Chapter 4
I did not sleep that night.
Sophie slept in my bed with both hands wrapped around Emily’s locket.
Every time she moved, I woke.
Every time a car passed outside, my hand reached for the phone.
Amanda was gone.
The police removed her from my house just after midnight under a temporary protective order.
Vanessa left with an officer escort.
Richard and Patricia drove away separately without looking at each other.
The house felt hollow afterward.
Not peaceful.
Hollow.
At 5:12 a.m., Sophie woke and whispered, “Is she coming back?”
I turned toward her.
“No.”
“She said you would change your mind.”
“I won’t.”
“She said grown-ups always pick wives.”
I pulled her close.
“Then she never understood me.”
Sophie pressed her ear against my chest.
“Can I stay home from school?”
“Yes.”
“Forever?”
I kissed her hair.
“For today.”
At eight, Mark came back with coffee, a court filing, and a private investigator named Grace Miller.
Grace had worked fraud cases for twenty years.
She had the calm eyes of someone who knew people were usually worse than their excuses.
She sat at my kitchen table and spread out a timeline.
“Emily died nineteen months ago,” she said. “Amanda met you four months later.”
“At a charity auction Vanessa invited me to.”
Grace circled the date.
“Amanda moved in after eleven months.”
“Yes.”
“Trust activates when Sophie turns six.”
“Next month.”
Grace tapped the boarding school brochure.
“And this school requires guardian transfer authority for minors in long-term residential programs.”
My stomach twisted.
“They wanted me to sign Sophie away.”
“They wanted you to think you had.”
Mark slid the forged consent forms toward Grace.
“She didn’t forge only these.”
He placed another paper beside them.
A draft petition naming Amanda as Sophie’s residential guardian in case of my incapacity.
My vision blurred.
“Incapacity?”
Grace nodded.
“Daniel, did Amanda ever encourage medication? Sleep aids? Stress leave?”
I thought of the tea she brought every night.
The one that made me sleep too hard.
The headaches I blamed on grief.
The mornings I woke up dizzy.
My mouth went dry.
“She made me tea.”
Mark looked at Grace.
Grace wrote it down.
Sophie sat at the counter eating toast.
She listened to everything even when pretending not to.
I lowered my voice.
“She drank it too.”
“Did she?” Grace asked.
I remembered Amanda carrying a cup.
I remembered her kissing me goodnight.
I did not remember seeing her drink.
A chill moved through me.
Grace asked for the tea tin.
I found it in the pantry behind the coffee.
Chamomile.
Unopened seal missing.
White powder gathered along the inner rim.
Grace did not touch it barehanded.
She bagged it.
Sophie whispered, “That’s the sleepy tea.”
I turned.
Amanda had given it to Sophie too.
My knees nearly gave out.
“What?”
Sophie looked scared.
“When I cried for Mommy. Amanda said good girls drink sleepy tea.”
Mark’s hand tightened around his pen until it snapped.
Grace’s voice stayed controlled.
“How often?”
Sophie shrugged.
“When she wanted me quiet.”
I walked outside before I punched a wall in front of my daughter.
The porch air burned my lungs.
Mark followed.
“We’ll request emergency testing.”
“She drugged my child.”
“We don’t know yet.”
I turned on him.
“She locked her in a closet, forged my signature, stole Emily’s necklace, and hid documents about my wife’s death. Don’t give me comfort dressed as caution.”
Mark accepted that.
“You’re right.”
By noon, we were in court.
Amanda’s lawyer argued I was unstable.
Vanessa sat behind him, staring at Sophie like my daughter was a locked safe.
Sophie sat beside me in a yellow sweater, holding the bunny.
When the judge asked if she wanted to speak, she looked at me.
“You don’t have to,” I whispered.
She stood anyway.
Her voice was tiny.
“Amanda said if I told Daddy, Mommy would be sad in heaven.”
The courtroom went silent.
Amanda covered her face.
Vanessa looked furious.
The judge granted the protective order for Sophie and me.
Amanda was banned from the house, school, daycare, and any contact.
Vanessa was included.
The judge also froze Sophie’s trust pending investigation.
Vanessa shot to her feet.
“You can’t do that!”
Her lawyer grabbed her sleeve.
Too late.
Everyone saw what she cared about first.
After court, Detective Harris approached me.
“We’re reopening questions around Emily Hayes’s medical file.”
I gripped Sophie’s hand.
“What did you find?”
He glanced at her, then back at me.
“Not here.”
That evening, Grace called.
“The tea tested positive for a sedative.”
I sat down hard.
“There’s more,” she said.
I closed my eyes.
“Tell me.”
“We found pharmacy records tied to Dr. Cole’s office.”
“For Amanda?”
“No.”
May you like
Grace paused.
“For Emily.”
