Chapter 6

Ezra’s POV

“That box is the property of Hannah Rivers’ estate,” I said. “And the heir is standing right here.”

Every head in the bank lobby turned.

I’d come through the revolving door at a walk, with Idan a step behind me and two of my own security men at the entrance. I didn’t raise my voice. I have never needed to. I put my hands in my pockets and crossed the marble floor, and the two men in dark suits, who had been reaching for Aya’s arm, froze.

Ilana Sterling turned. For one second, her face went completely blank.

Then she smiled.

“Mr. Blackwell,” she said. “What a surprise.”

“Is it?”

“I didn’t think you’d be here. In a bank. At ten in the morning.” Her voice was honey. “This is a family matter. My sister has taken an item that belongs to my father. I’m simply retrieving it.”

“Your sister.”

“Yes.”

“Aya Rivers is not a Sterling.”

“She was raised in our house.”

“As a guest. By your own father’s admission.” I didn’t look at Aya. I couldn’t. If I did, I’d lose my temper. “Gentlemen. Step back.”

“We work for Sterling Trust,” said the bigger man.

“I know. I have your names, your salaries, and the account number that paid you for carrying an unconscious woman into a hotel room three nights ago.” I smiled. It’s not a pleasant smile. “The Seattle police have very good patience. Shall I call them, or will you?”

The bigger man’s eyes flickered. He looked at Ilana.

“Go,” she said, without turning.

They went. They walked to the revolving door like two dogs who had been hit with a rolled-up newspaper. The door whispered around behind them.

Ilana lingered. Her eyes moved from me to Aya, and back. Her lips curled.

“You’re making a mistake, Mr. Blackwell,” she said softly. “She isn’t what she seems.”

“Neither are you.”

“She’s a liar. She’ll cost you everything.”

“I’ll take my chances.”

“You don’t even know,” said Ilana, and she gave a small, wondering laugh. “Oh. You don’t know. How sweet.”

She walked out.

I let out a breath I hadn’t known I was holding.

“Sir,” said Idan quietly. “The car.”

I turned.

Aya stood by the stone pillar, gray-faced, gripping her bag with both hands. Her friend Liron was at her elbow, ferocious and shaking. Aya looked at me, and for a moment, I saw her eyes fill.

“You followed me.”

“I had a man on the bank since eight.”

“I told you not to.”

“You did.”

“You did it anyway.”

“Yes.”

“You’re the most infuriating person I’ve ever met,” said Aya, in a small, cracked voice, and then, without warning, she swayed.

I caught her before she reached the floor.

~

I don’t remember deciding to carry her.

I remember her weight against my chest, so light it frightened me. Her head lolling on my shoulder. Liron running beside me, saying, “She hasn’t eaten, she’s been sick since Tuesday, she needs a doctor,” and Idan holding the car door, and the smell of orange blossom and rain in my collar.

The Blackwell penthouse takes up the top floor of a glass tower on Lake Union. I don’t live there much. Idan calls it an expensive hotel I happen to own. It has white walls and gray sofas and a view that costs twelve thousand dollars a month, and I have never once stood in it and felt that anyone was home.

I put her on the bed in the guest room and stepped back.

She was breathing. Her color was coming back, slowly. Liron perched at the edge of the mattress and held her hand, and stared at me as if I were about to steal the silver.

“Doctor’s on the way,” I said.

“She doesn’t need a doctor.”

“She fainted.”

“She’s fine. She’s just, she’s tired. She hasn’t been sleeping.”

“Ms. Park.” I kept my voice quiet. “You don’t have to lie to me.”

Liron’s jaw set. She looked at Aya. Then she looked at the floor.

“I’m going to get her some water,” she muttered, and went out.

I stood at the foot of the bed. The room was very quiet. Afternoon light lay in a long gold bar across the coverlet. Aya’s lashes were dark against her cheeks. A small strand of hair had fallen across her mouth, and I wanted, so badly it hurt, to push it back.

I didn’t.

On the bedside table sat her bag, where Idan had left it. It had fallen open. A black leather notebook lay half out, with a piece of old ribbon around it.

I shouldn’t have looked. I looked.

The cover was blank. But at the corner of the first page, exposed by the tilt of the bag, there was a name. In faded blue ink, in a cramped slanting hand I had seen a thousand times on lab reports and shipping labels and birthday cards.

D. Blackwell.

My father’s handwriting.

I put a hand out and steadied myself on the bedpost.

There was a knock at the door.

“Mr. Blackwell? Dr. Osei.”

I let her in. She was a brisk, silver-haired woman in a cardigan, with a black bag and the manner of a woman who’d delivered half of Seattle’s board of directors. She looked at Aya, sniffed, and looked at me.

“Out,” she said.

“I...”

“Out. Give me twenty minutes.”

I went out.

I stood in the hallway with my back against the wall, eyes shut, my thumb pressing hard against my wallet. My father’s name in her mother’s notebook. Hannah’s daughter’s name on Sterling’s badge. Two dead partners, one lab, one perfume, one house on Medina Road.

I’d been so sure I was hunting a ghost.

I hadn’t thought the ghost had a daughter who’d sit beside me at a bar and say, Nobody’s ever got that right.

The door opened.

I was at the far end of the hall by the window, hands braced on the sill, and they didn’t see me. Dr. Osei stepped out and shut the door softly behind her. Liron came running up the corridor with a glass of water and a face like a stormcloud.

“Well?” said Liron.

“Dehydrated. Exhausted. Blood pressure’s low. She needs food, rest, and much less stress than she’s been getting.” Dr. Osei took off her glasses and folded them. Her voice dropped, gentle and low. “And she’s about five weeks along, dear. I’m assuming she knows.”

“She just found out.”

“Then she needs someone with her. Someone steady.” A pause. “And if there’s a father in the picture, he ought to be told.”

I stopped breathing.

“Five weeks,” Liron said, very quietly.

Five weeks ago, I sat at the end of a bar with a whiskey, and a woman who smelled of orange blossom said, I don’t do this.

The corridor tilted.

Neither of them heard me put my back against the window. Neither of them saw my face.

Behind the door, very faintly, I heard Aya wake.

“Liron?” she called, thin and scared. “Liron, where am I?”

I didn’t move.

I stood with my hand flat against the wall, the paint cold under my palm, listening to the woman in that room breathe. And under the noise of my own heart, one clear, quiet, unmistakable thought rose up and filled every corner of me.

I’m going to be a father.