Chapter 5 - The Man in the Car
Ethan didn’t ask Noah to explain again. The boy had already said what he knew, and the way he gripped the backpack told Ethan enough about what it had cost him to say it.
“Lauren, can you get the plate?”
She was already reaching for her phone. “I’ll photograph it and write it down.”
Ethan crouched beside Caleb, who had pressed the stuffed fox to his chest. “We’re going out the back way. You stay with me and your brother, okay?”
Caleb nodded without looking up.
Noah glanced toward the sedan. “Will he follow us?”
“I don’t know,” Ethan said. He didn’t dress the truth up. “But we won’t make it easy.”
Lauren moved to the front window, shielding her phone with one hand as she took several pictures. Ethan led the boys down the narrow service stairs, the air carrying the damp smell of brick and old cooking oil. At the rear door he paused, listening. Nothing but a truck groaning along the alley.
They slipped outside.
Lauren joined them moments later, phone in hand. Her face was composed, but her fingers tightened around the device.
“I have the plate. And a clear shot of the driver.”
“Did he see you?”
“He saw something.” She looked toward the alley mouth. “Let’s go.”
They split into two cars. Lauren took Noah and Caleb to a second place she trusted, while Ethan headed for St. Vincent’s. Before he pulled away, Noah pressed his face near the open window.
“You’re going to see Mom?”
“Yes.”
“Tell her we’re together.”
Ethan met his eyes. “I will.”
At the hospital, the antiseptic smell caught in the back of his throat. He found Hannah’s room with the oldest letter still folded in his jacket pocket, its paper warm against his chest. A nurse stood outside the door, checking a chart.
“She’s been resting,” she said. “If she wakes, keep things calm. She’s still being evaluated.”
Ethan nodded, though calm felt like a promise he had no right to make.
He stepped inside. Hannah lay pale against the white pillow, a bruise shadowing one temple. A monitor traced steady green lines beside her. He pulled a chair close but didn’t touch her.
“I got your note,” he whispered. “I’m looking for the receipts.”
Her eyelids didn’t move.
Ethan’s phone buzzed. Daniel’s name filled the screen. He declined the call.
It rang again.
This time Ethan answered, keeping his voice low. “What?”
“I heard you moved the boys,” Daniel said. “You don’t need to manage all of this alone. I can take them somewhere safe.”
Ethan stared at Hannah’s still face. “You’re not taking my sons anywhere.”
“I’m offering help.”
“You offered a car before. I said no.”
A pause, then a soft exhale. “You’re making every decent gesture sound like a threat.”
“You showed up at the hospital demanding their backpack.”
“I was trying to keep a volatile situation from getting worse.”
“Then stop making it worse.”
Daniel’s voice sharpened. “You have no idea how much damage this could do—to the boys, to Hannah, to the company.”
Ethan ended the call.
Hannah’s fingers moved against the blanket.
He leaned forward. “Hannah?”
Her eyes opened, unfocused at first. Then they found him. She looked older than the woman he remembered, and not only because of the bruising. The sight of her alive brought relief so fierce it hurt; the guardedness in her gaze hurt differently.
“You came,” she murmured.
“I’m here.”
Her eyes shifted to the phone in his hand. “Was that Daniel?”
“Yes.”
Her fingers tightened in the sheet. “He wants the boys?”
“He says he wants to help.”
A small, bitter sound escaped her. She tried to sit up, then flinched. Ethan rose, but she lifted one hand to stop him.
“Don’t,” she whispered. “I can do it.”
He sat back down, respecting the space she’d asked for even as every instinct in him urged him closer.
“I saw the man who watched you,” Ethan said. “Noah recognized him outside the apartment. Lauren got his plate.”
Hannah’s breathing quickened. “The man in the car?”
“Yes. Do you know him?”
Her eyes closed for a moment. When she opened them, fear had sharpened her voice.
“I saw him with Daniel.”
Ethan felt his hand curl against his knee. “When?”
“Outside Daniel’s office. More than once.” She swallowed, wincing. “I didn’t know his name. I knew he wasn’t there for business.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure he watched me.” Her gaze held Ethan’s. “And Daniel knew I was back in Chicago.”
The room seemed to contract around them. Ethan thought of the sedan across the street, the man sitting motionless behind its wheel, and Noah’s pale face at the window.
“Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
“I tried to tell you everything.” She turned her face away. “You never got the letters.”
The accusation wasn’t loud. It didn’t need to be. Ethan looked down at the folded page in his pocket, remembering the words he had read and the years he’d mistaken silence for an answer.
“I know,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
Hannah’s gaze returned to him, searching—not for a grand apology, he realized, but for whether he would demand that one be enough.
“I hid the receipts where you and I used to leave things for each other,” she said. “You’ll know the place.”
A memory stirred: a private ritual, a place that belonged to their old, foolish confidence that they could always find one another. He kept his face still, unwilling to turn her clue into another question she didn’t have strength to answer.
“I’ll find them,” he said.
Hannah’s hand slipped over the edge of the bed. Ethan reached for it, then stopped just short, giving her the choice.
May you like
She caught his wrist.
“Ethan,” she whispered. “Your mother knew I was pregnant.”
