Chapter 1 - THE RAG DOLL
Celestine’s hand was already coming away from the fireplace when I entered the room.
At first I saw only flame.
Then Poppy screamed.
My five-year-old daughter was on her knees several feet from the hearth, both hands stretched toward the fire as though she could pull something back without touching it.
Celestine stood over her.
“That filthy thing belongs in the fire,” she said. “Next time, it will be you.”
I saw the doll.
And everything inside me changed.
“Poppy!”
The rag doll struck the black metal grate and folded awkwardly against it.
One side of its faded blue dress began smoking.
The thing was ugly by anyone else’s standards.
One button eye sat higher than the other.
Its yellow yarn hair had been repaired twice.
The mouth was sewn crooked.
Poppy loved it more than almost anything she owned.
Her mother had made it.
Mara had spent three nights sewing it when Poppy was still small enough to sleep on my chest.
Mara had been dead for sixteen months.
I crossed the room and grabbed the fireplace tongs.
“Gage—”
“Stay away from her.”
I reached through the fire screen.
The doll’s fabric smoked against the metal.
The smell of singed cotton filled the room.
I caught one leg with the tongs and dragged it out.
The doll landed on the stone hearth.
Small embers broke loose.
They died against the stone.
Poppy ran into me so hard I almost lost my balance.
“Daddy!”
I dropped the tongs and wrapped one arm around her.
“I’ve got you.”
“She burned Mommy’s doll!”
“I know.”
“She said—”
“I heard.”
Poppy’s whole body shook.
I looked over her head at Celestine.
Seven months earlier, I had put an engagement ring on that woman’s hand.
Three weeks earlier, we had booked a wedding venue.
Ten minutes earlier, I had believed the biggest problem in our house was that Poppy still refused to let Celestine help brush her hair.
Now my fiancée had threatened my child beside an open fire.
“What happened?”
Celestine lifted her chin.
“She threw a tantrum.”
Poppy cried harder.
“No!”
“About the doll?”
“That thing is disgusting.”
“It belonged to Mara.”
“Exactly.”
The word landed strangely.
Exactly.
As though that explained more than dirt.
I released Poppy only enough to kneel beside the doll.
The fabric on one side had blackened.
The stomach seam had split.
Something clear reflected near the opening.
I frowned.
Used two fingers to separate the torn fabric.
A tiny plastic-wrapped object slid out.
It struck the hearth.
Then landed beside my shoe.
USB drive.
I stared.
Poppy saw it.
Her face changed.
“Daddy.”
“What?”
She grabbed my sleeve.
“Mommy said never let Celestine find it.”
The room disappeared around that sentence.
I looked at my daughter.
“When did Mommy tell you that?”
Poppy was crying too hard to answer.
I reached down and picked up the USB.
Celestine moved.
One step.
Toward me.
“Give me that.”
I looked at her.
“What is it?”
“Nothing.”
“Then why do you want it?”
“I don’t.”
“You just told me to give it to you.”
“I meant because it could be dangerous. Malware. Whatever.”
Her voice had changed.
The cruelty vanished.
Something faster had replaced it.
Fear.
“What did Mara put on this?”
“I don’t know.”
Poppy clutched my trousers.
Celestine stepped closer again.
I stood.
“Don’t.”
“Gage, you’re being ridiculous.”
“You threatened my daughter.”
“She was screaming at me.”
“She is five.”
“She has been allowed to worship a dead woman in this house for over a year.”
I stared at her.
“You mean her mother.”
Celestine’s nostrils flared.
“I mean this entire house has been trapped in grief.”
I held up the USB.
“And this?”
Her eyes followed it.
“That recording won’t prove I did anything.”
Silence.
I had not called it a recording.
Had not said audio.
Video.
Anything.
I looked at the USB.
Then at her.
“I never said it was a recording.”
Her face emptied.
I wish I could say I made a careful decision next.
I didn’t.
I slapped her.
One open hand.
Hard.
Her head snapped sideways.
She stumbled backward into the narrow side table.
The lamp fell.
Glass shattered.
Celestine lost her balance and hit the floor.
Poppy screamed again.
Instantly, shame cut through the rage.
I stepped back.
The danger had not required that.
I could have moved Poppy away.
Called police.
Asked Celestine to leave.
Instead I hit her.
That was mine.
I would answer for it.
Celestine pushed herself upright among the lamp pieces.
One hand pressed against her cheek.
Her eyes were wet with rage.
“You hit me.”
“Yes.”
“You’re going to regret that.”
“Maybe.”
I took Poppy’s hand.
“But you’re leaving.”
“This is my home too.”
“No.”
“Gage—”
“No.”
She looked at the USB again.
That fear returned.
And I finally understood that if I let her walk out with a phone, a laptop, or access to anything Mara had left behind, I might lose whatever my wife had hidden sixteen months ago.
I called the police.
Then I called my lawyer.
Then I did something that would matter more than either.
I put the USB on the stone hearth where everyone could see it.
May you like
And I did not plug it into anything.
Not yet.
