Chapter 5

The phone rang four times. Then a woman answered, hoarse and fast. “Hello? Hello?”

“Dani?”

Silence. Then a breath. “Who is this?”

“My name is Emmie. I’m Derek’s wife.”

The line went so quiet I thought she’d hung up. Then she started crying. Not soft. Ugly, gulping, like she’d been holding it for weeks.

“Is Poppy okay?”

The floor tilted under me. I put my hand on the wall. “You’re supposed to be dead.”

“What?”

“Derek said you died. In 2019. Overdose.”

She laughed, wet and broken. “He said that?”

“He cried about it.”

“He’s a liar,” she said. “He’s a liar, and I’m a coward, and my daughter-”

She stopped. I could hear a TV in the background. A motel TV. A heater clicking.

“Where are you?” I asked.

“Colchester. A motel. I have a black eye and a protection order and no car. Is Poppy with you?”

“Yes.”

She made a sound like she’d been hit. “Is she hurt?”

“She’s cold. She’s scared. She has one shoe.”

“Oh God.”

“Tell me why she was in a shanty on Lake Champlain.”

“I gave her to Derek,” Dani said. “December twenty-seventh. In the Dunkin’ lot in Swanton. I was hiding from Kyle. He found the apartment. He put his hands on me in front of her. I called Derek because I didn’t have anyone else.”

“You gave your daughter to a man who keeps her in an ice shanty?”

“He said he had a place. He said he would keep her safe until I got the order.”

“He’s selling her,” I said. “Tomorrow morning. Six a.m. Boat launch. A man named Bo.”

The crying stopped. “No.”

“There’s a phone. Texts. A photo of her in his truck. He priced her.”

“No,” she said again. But she knew. I could hear her knowing.

“Why would he do that?” I asked.

“He owes people,” she whispered. “He always owes people.”

“He told me you were dead.”

“He told me you were fine with it.”

I closed my eyes. “Fine with what?”

She didn’t answer.

“Dani. Fine with what?”

“The baby,” she said. “He said you were giving me the baby.”

The shop went away. The minnow tanks, the stove, the child counting under her breath-all of it went thin and far. “What?”

“He said you couldn’t keep it. He said you were sick. He said you wanted me to have it. He said once the baby was born, I could take it and raise it, and then Poppy could stay with him. He said nobody would look for Poppy if there was a baby called Poppy in the family.”

I couldn’t breathe. “He said that.”

“He said you knew.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Oh God,” she said. “Oh God, Emmie.”

I looked at Poppy. She was wrapped in the horse blanket, watching me. Her hair was badly braided. Her face was dirty. She had been kept in a shanty for three weeks. She had been fed tuna sandwiches with the crusts cut off. She had been told her mother gave her away.

“He was going to give you my baby,” I said.

“I didn’t know about Bo,” Dani said. “I swear. I thought he was hiding her. I thought he was helping.”

“He was helping himself.”

She started crying again. I held the receiver so hard my cut hand throbbed. The pay phone ate another quarter. I fed it.

“Where is he now?” Dani asked.

“On the lake. Coming here.”

“Emmie, you have to run.”

“I have a five-year-old and I’m nine months pregnant. I’m not running anywhere.”

“Then call the police.”

“I did. They’re coming.”

“Don’t let him take her.”

“I won’t.”

I hung up. The dial tone came back. Poppy slid off the bench and walked over to me. She put her hand on my belly. She didn’t ask permission. She just did it.

“Is your baby coming?” she asked.

“Not yet.”

“Uncle D said your baby was coming.”

I knelt down, as much as I could. “Poppy, did Uncle D ever hurt you?”

She looked at the floor. “He said Mama didn’t want me.”

“That’s not true.”

“He said I was going to live with a man.”

My throat closed. “What man?”

“Bo.”

The name went through me like a fish hook. I stood up. Verne was at the register, her face wet, her hands shaking.

“Emmie,” she said. “I didn’t know.”

“Yes, you did.”

She nodded. “I didn’t want to know.”

The headlights swung across the minnow tanks.