Chapter 4

Elias let go of Poppy’s mouth. She stumbled back into my arms, shaking. He stood in front of the door, breathing hard, the security earpiece crackling with questions he didn’t answer.

“You faked your death,” I said.

He laughed once, ugly. “You say it like I had a choice.”

“You had a trial. You had a family. You had me.”

“I had three dead children and a lab tech who was going to testify that I signed off on the batch.” He wiped his face. “Nadia was already in the records. Her name was on the shipping forms. I let them believe what they wanted.”

“You let them put her in prison.”

“She was going to leave me anyway.”

I struck him with my cane before I knew I had moved. It caught him across the shoulder. He staggered, more surprised than hurt.

“You destroyed her,” I said. “You destroyed your daughter’s life. You let me believe you were a victim.”

“Poppy doesn’t know I’m her father,” he said quickly. “Nadia never told her. I didn’t even know until she was three. By then, what was I supposed to do? Walk into a courtroom and confess?”

“Yes,” I said. “That is exactly what you were supposed to do.”

He looked at Poppy, then away. “You can fix this, Mother. You’re Vera Calder. You can make the foundation pay the families. Quiet settlements. New evidence. You can say the batch code was misread. You can save the Calder name.”

I heard the plea under the command. He was still my son. That was the horror. He was still the boy I had rocked through fevers, the boy who had once cried over a dead bird in the garden. And he was a monster who had let a woman rot for his crime.

“What do you want from me?” I asked.

“Help me. We can make Nadia’s appeal disappear. We can put Poppy somewhere safe. No one has to know.”

I nodded slowly. “All right.”

Poppy’s hand tightened on my skirt. She was smart enough to hear the lie in my voice. Elias was not. Hope made him stupid.

I knelt in front of Poppy. “What did your mother tell you about the guard?”

Poppy looked at Elias. Her lip trembled, but her voice came out clear. “She said don’t trust the guard. He is the man who hurt us.”

Elias lunged.