I looked at him.
“Did you ever tell her that?”
“Tell her what?”
“That I was struggling.”
He looked down.
“I told her you were exhausted.”
I stood.
“So you gave her exactly what she needed.”
“Rachel—”
“No.”
I walked to the window.
Outside, police lights moved across the wet street.
“You gave her my weaknesses.”
“I was trying to get help.”
“You got help from the woman who was watching me.”
He flinched.
“I didn’t know.”
“I know.”
I turned.
“That’s the problem.”
Margaret’s lawyer arrived that afternoon.
She refused to speak to police.
But she sent one message through him.
She wanted to speak to Trevor.
Alone.
Detective Brooks refused.
So Trevor sat across from her in an interrogation room while I watched through the glass.
Margaret looked smaller than she had at the funeral.
Her hands were cuffed.
She stared at her son.
“You look terrible.”
Trevor didn’t respond.
“Are you eating?”
“Why did you kill my children?”
Margaret looked down.
“I didn’t mean for them to die.”
Trevor’s face changed.
“Then you admit you gave them something?”
She closed her eyes.
“I gave them what I gave you.”
“What does that mean?”
“When you were a baby, you couldn’t sleep.”
Trevor stared at her.
“I don’t remember.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“What did you give me?”
“Something to help you.”
Trevor leaned forward.
“What did you give my sons?”
She didn’t answer.
He slammed his palm against the table.
“Answer me.”
Margaret looked at him.
“Something to make them sleep.”
His face drained.
“How much?”
“I miscalculated.”
“Miscounted?”
She shook her head.
“I thought their bodies could handle it.”
Trevor stared at her.
“You killed them.”
Margaret’s expression hardened.
“They were already taking everything from you.”
“They were babies.”
“They were destroying your marriage.”
“That was not your decision.”
“You weren’t yourself.”
“Because I had newborn twins!”
“You were trapped.”
“I was their father.”
“And you were miserable.”
Trevor stood.
“Get out of my life.”
Margaret looked up sharply.
“You don’t understand.”
“No. I finally do.”
She leaned toward him.
“Your wife was going to leave you.”
He stopped.
“What?”
“She told me.”
Trevor looked toward the glass.
I stood motionless on the other side.
Margaret smiled.
“She said she couldn’t do it anymore.”
I felt the blood leave my face.
It wasn’t true.
But it was close enough to hurt.
There had been one night when I had told Margaret, in frustration, that I couldn’t keep living the way we were living.
I had meant the exhaustion.
The constant crying.
The fear.
The endless appointments.
I had said, Sometimes I want to run away for one day.
Margaret had remembered.
And twisted it.
Trevor turned back to her.
“You lied.”
“Did I?”
“You knew what she meant.”
“I knew what she said.”
He walked out.
That evening, he came to our bedroom.
He stood in the doorway.
“I owe you an apology.”
I folded a shirt.
“For which part?”
“All of it.”
I kept folding.
“I should have listened to you.”
“Yes.”
“I should have protected you.”
“Yes.”
“I should have questioned my mother.”
“Yes.”
He nodded.
“I don’t expect you to forgive me.”
I looked at him.
“I don’t know if I can.”
He swallowed.
“I understand.”
He started to leave.
“Trevor.”
He stopped.
“Did you believe her when she said I wanted to leave you?”
He didn’t turn.
“For a moment.”
I nodded.
“Why?”
“Because I knew you were unhappy.”
“I was.”
“I thought maybe I was the reason.”
“You were part of it.”
He turned.
I didn’t soften the words.
“You kept choosing silence.”
He nodded.
“I know.”
I looked down at the shirt in my hands.
“She didn’t destroy our marriage by herself.”
Trevor said nothing.
“She found the cracks.”
Three days later, the laboratory confirmed the sedative in the bottle residue matched the compound found in the twins.
But there was something else.
A second substance.
A medication that could cause confusion, fatigue, memory problems, and impaired judgment when taken repeatedly.
It had been found in my blood.
And in Trevor’s.
I stared at the report.
“Trevor was poisoned too?”
Detective Brooks nodded.
“Small doses.”
“Why?”
“To make both of you exhausted.”
“Why would she do that?”
“Think about what your mother-in-law wanted.”
I did.
She wanted me gone.
She wanted Trevor dependent on her.
She wanted him to believe I was unstable.
She wanted the twins gone.
But there was still something missing.
The phone call.
Emma had heard Margaret speaking to someone.
After tonight, she’ll have no choice.
Who had she been talking to?
Detective Brooks had the answer.
Margaret’s phone records showed a call lasting eleven minutes on the night of the twins’ deaths.
The number belonged to a private investigator.
Not a doctor.
Not a pharmacist.
A private investigator named Daniel Voss.
Trevor knew the name.
He went pale.
“That’s the man Mom hired to follow Rachel.”
I looked at him.
“What?”
“She told me she’d hired someone to make sure you weren’t seeing someone else.”
I stared.
“I wasn’t.”
“I know.”
Detective Brooks leaned forward.
“Did you know about this?”
“No.”
“Then why did your mother hire him?”
Trevor shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
Detective Brooks opened another file.
“We found his report.”
Inside were photographs.
Me leaving work.
Me at the grocery store.
Me sitting in my car.
Me crying outside the pediatrician’s office.
And one photograph of me standing beside a man.
I frowned.
“Who is that?”
Trevor leaned closer.
“It’s Dr. Mason.”
My stomach dropped.
“Why was I talking to him?”
Detective Brooks looked at me.
“That’s what we need to find out.”
Part IV — Reckoning
Dr. Mason was the pediatrician who had treated the twins.
He was also the doctor I had spoken to three days before they died.
I had forgotten the conversation.
Not entirely.
Pieces.
His office.
A paper cup.
His concern.
His question.
“Are you certain you’re taking everything exactly as prescribed?”
I had said yes.
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