“Yes, if done properly. But she also appears to have a small consulting company. Connor’s business paid that company twenty-five thousand dollars around the same time the release documents were processed.”
I stared at the photo.
Lavender perfume.
Silver glasses.
A kind voice on the phone.
Mrs. Fleming, I know this process is hard. We’ll take good care of everything.
I had believed her.
“Why would she do it?” I asked.
“Money, perhaps. Loyalty to Connor. Pressure. We don’t know.”
I picked up the photo.
Something about her eyes made memory stir again.
“She knew me,” I said.
Kenneth frowned. “From the clinic.”
“No.” I shook my head slowly. “Before that.”
He waited.
I searched through years of faces. Hospital fundraisers. Medical school events. Fertility seminars. Charity panels. Waiting rooms. Conference badges.
Then it came to me.
“My mother,” I whispered.
Kenneth leaned forward. “What about her?”
“Dana worked for my mother’s oncologist years ago. Not as a nurse. Front desk, maybe billing. I remember because she sent flowers after my mother died.” I looked up. “Why would she later work at my fertility clinic?”
Kenneth’s expression changed.
Not dramatically.
Enough.
“That may be coincidence,” he said.
“But you don’t think it is.”
“I think we need to verify timelines.”
My office felt colder.
I looked at the rain-streaked window.
My mother had died six years before Connor and I started fertility treatments. She had never known how hard we tried. Never sat with me through failed cycles. Never told me whether hope was worth the pain.
