Chapter 1
Rocco did not question Preston in the pavilion.
He did not question Brenda either.
His daughter came first.
Audrey was sitting against the base of the orchid stand with both hands around her stomach.
“Dad.”
“I’m here.”
“The baby.”
“I know.”
He called for the private physician stationed at the reception, then ordered an ambulance anyway.
Preston tried to approach.
Audrey recoiled.
Rocco stepped between them.
“Stay where you are.”
“She’s my wife.”
Rocco looked at him.
“Then you should’ve moved when your sister put her hands on her.”
Preston stopped.
That mattered.
Rocco had noticed it during the attack.
Preston had not frozen from shock.
He had simply stood there.
Audrey was taken to Northwestern Memorial for monitoring.
The baby’s heartbeat remained strong.
There were no signs of placental injury.
Audrey had bruising along her shoulder and hip, but the obstetrician believed both mother and baby were stable.
Rocco sat beside her bed long after midnight.
Audrey stared at the blanket.
“What did Gary mean?”
Rocco did not lie.
“I don’t know yet.”
Audrey swallowed.
“I do.”
He looked at her.
“Six weeks ago.”
Rocco remembered the call.
Audrey had fallen down three steps outside Preston’s Lincoln Park townhouse.
She had bruised her back badly enough to spend a night in the hospital.
The baby survived.
Everyone called it an accident.
Snowmelt.
A wet stone step.
Bad shoes.
Audrey had believed it too.
“At least,” she whispered, “I tried to.”
Rocco leaned forward.
“What happened before you fell?”
Audrey thought.
“I was leaving.”
“Going where?”
“Your house.”
Rocco’s expression changed.
“For dinner?”
Audrey shook her head.
“To stay.”
The room became quiet.
“I was going to leave Preston that night.”
Rocco stared at his daughter.
“You never told me.”
“I was ashamed.”
“Of what?”
“That I married someone I was afraid to go home to.”
That sentence changed everything.
May you like
The first fall had not happened randomly during a winter evening.
It had happened the night Audrey tried to leave her husband.
