Chapter 2 - THE EXAMINATION
Ames was interviewed before he was allowed back inside.
Detective Mara Ellis asked about the slap first.
Good.
Facts in the correct order.
“You struck him?”
“Yes.”
“Open hand?”
“Yes.”
“After he released Darby?”
“Yes.”
“Was he advancing on you when you struck him?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
Ames looked through the small window in the trauma-room door.
“Because my daughter said he threatened her mother.”
“That explains anger.”
“It doesn’t make the slap self-defense.”
Detective Ellis watched him for a second.
“No.”
“I know.”
That answer appeared to matter.
The detective moved on.
Relationship.
Ames was Darby’s biological father.
Darby’s mother, Nora, had married the stepfather two years earlier.
Ames and Nora shared legal custody.
Darby spent alternating weeks with them except when school schedules changed.
“Why was she with him today?”
“Nora was supposed to be with her.”
“Where is Nora?”
“I don’t know.”
“You haven’t spoken?”
“Yesterday morning.”
“What did she say?”
“That Darby fell while playing in the garage and hurt her arm.”
“Did you talk to Darby?”
“No. Nora said she was sleeping.”
“Did that concern you?”
“Yes.”
“What did you do?”
“I told her I was coming to the hospital after work.”
“Did the stepfather object?”
“He texted that I’d only upset Darby.”
“Did he often interfere with contact?”
Ames hesitated.
Important question.
“Sometimes.”
“How?”
“Calls missed. Plans changed. Darby supposedly didn’t want to talk.”
“Did you believe that?”
“Sometimes.”
The word tasted terrible.
Detective Ellis did not shame him.
Good.
“What has he said about Darby?”
“That she lies. Exaggerates. Wants attention.”
“For how long?”
“Maybe eight months.”
“Examples?”
Darby said the stepfather locked her outside once.
He said she walked out herself.
Darby said he smashed her toy.
He said it broke accidentally.
Darby said Mom cried because he yelled.
Nora said they had argued but everything was fine.
Darby said she did not like sleeping at their house because the stepfather “checks things.”
Ames had asked what that meant.
Darby had shrugged.
He had not pushed.
That memory would hurt for years.
The child-protection pediatrician emerged.
Dr. Elena Patel.
She asked Ames to sit.
He hated immediately that she wanted him sitting.
“Darby’s arm injury is stable.”
“Fracture?”
“Yes. Nondisplaced fracture near the proximal humerus. The sling is appropriate for now.”
“How did it happen?”
“We’re still evaluating whether the reported mechanism is consistent.”
“And her legs?”
Dr. Patel paused.
“There are injuries requiring documentation.”
“What injuries?”
“I’m going to tell you what I can without contaminating the investigation or Darby’s account.”
Ames’s hands closed.
“Is she badly hurt?”
“Nothing we’ve identified is immediately life-threatening.”
That was not the same as fine.
“There are bruises and abrasions around both lower legs and ankles.”
Ames stopped breathing.
“From the boots?”
“We don’t know.”
“Did the boots cause them?”
“We don’t know.”
“What do they look like?”
“We are documenting pattern, age, distribution, and whether they fit accidental injury.”
“What else?”
“Darby has older bruises in several stages of healing.”
Ames stared.
“Where?”
“Legs. Upper arm. Back.”
His stomach turned.
“Why didn’t anyone see?”
“Some were covered by clothing.”
He thought of summer dresses.
Swimming.
Darby had avoided the pool at his house twice.
Said water was too cold.
It had been ninety degrees.
“What happens now?”
“Darby stays here tonight.”
“Can she come home with me?”
“That depends on child protection and family court. Given the allegations, no one is sending her back with the stepfather tonight.”
“And Nora?”
“We need to locate her.”
Detective Ellis already had officers driving to the house.
Ames stood.
“I’m going.”
“No,” Ellis said.
“My ex-wife may be in danger.”
“Exactly why you are not going there while angry.”
That stopped him.
His slap had consequences already.
He hated that she was right.
Twenty-seven minutes later, Ellis’s phone rang.
She listened.
Her expression changed.
“Nora is alive.”
Ames closed his eyes.
“Is she okay?”
“She answered the door.”
“Is she hurt?”
“She says no.”
“Says?”
Ellis ignored the distinction.
“She says Darby fell from a workbench yesterday. Says the boots were Darby’s choice because she refuses normal shoes.”
Ames stared.
“That makes no sense.”
“Maybe.”
“She knows about the injuries?”
“She says Darby bruises easily.”
Ames stood.
“She’s protecting him.”
“Possibly.”
“Why?”
“We don’t know.”
Then Ellis added:
“Nora refuses to leave the house.”
That scared Ames more than if she had screamed for rescue.
Because Nora had always been stubborn.
Independent.
The woman who once moved a sofa up three flights of stairs because she refused to wait for delivery men.
If she was afraid enough to stand beside the man hurting their daughter and say everything was fine, Ames did not yet understand how deep this had gone.
Then the nurse brought Darby out for imaging.
The cut boots were gone.
Evidence.
Darby looked at Ames.
“Dad?”
He knelt.
“I’m here.”
“Mom okay?”
Ames forced himself not to lie.
“Police talked to her. She’s alive.”
Darby’s eyes filled.
“He didn’t hurt her?”
“I don’t know.”
She looked down.
Then whispered:
“He will now.”
Ames felt his blood turn cold.
“Why?”
“Because I let them cut it.”
The boot.
Not them.
It.
Singular.
Ames wanted to ask which boot.
What she believed it showed.
Who had put them on her.
Instead Dr. Patel gave him a warning look.
No leading questions.
So Ames only said:
“You did nothing wrong.”
Darby began crying.
May you like
And quietly, almost angrily, she answered:
“That’s not what he says.”
