Chapter 2 - The Doctor Who Was Supposed to Be Gone
Josephine slept badly.
At 2:13 in the morning she stopped pretending.
She sat at her tiny kitchen table in Brighton Park while the refrigerator hummed and Toby slept in the next room.
The hospital bill lay in front of her.
Dr. Adrian Vale.
She had met him dozens of times.
A soft-spoken man in his early fifties with silver beginning at his temples.
He had explained blood counts patiently.
He remembered Toby preferred grape-flavored medicine.
He had once spent forty minutes helping Josie understand why one transfusion could not simply be delayed because she was short on money.
Nothing about him seemed dangerous.
Nothing about him suggested a connection to Desmond Ror.
Yet Desmond had reacted as if a ghost had climbed out of the paper.
By seven the next morning, a black sedan waited outside Josie’s apartment.
She stared at it through the blinds.
Toby appeared behind her.
“Are we rich now?”
“No.”
“Then why is there a fancy car?”
“Because my boss has too many cars.”
Toby accepted that explanation immediately.
Desmond sat in the rear seat.
He wore a charcoal suit.
Black glove.
Cane resting beside his leg.
Toby climbed in.
“Morning.”
Desmond looked at him.
“Morning.”
“You promised airplane lessons.”
“I remember.”
“Mom forgets promises sometimes.”
“Toby.”
“What? You do.”
Desmond’s mouth twitched.
Josie climbed in beside her son.
During the drive, Desmond said almost nothing.
But Josie noticed his hand remained closed around the top of his cane.
At St. Bridget, Toby went upstairs with a nurse.
Josie followed until Desmond said quietly, “I need five minutes with Dr. Vale.”
“I’m coming.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“This doesn’t concern you.”
“It became my concern when you read my son’s paperwork.”
Their eyes met.
Desmond seemed ready to argue.
Then he nodded once.
Dr. Vale’s office was small and painfully ordinary.
Certificates.
Family photographs.
A dying plant near the window.
The doctor entered reading a tablet.
“Ms. Marlo, Toby’s numbers are—”
He looked up.
Stopped.
The tablet slipped half an inch in his hand.
Desmond said, “Hello, Adrian.”
Vale turned pale.
Josie felt the air change.
“Mr. Ror.”
“You remember me.”
“Of course.”
“That makes one of us.”
Vale closed the office door.
“What are you doing here?”
Desmond’s voice remained calm.
“Her son is your patient.”
Vale glanced at Josie.
Then back at Desmond.
“I treat hundreds of children.”
“You told me I was infertile.”
Vale’s jaw tightened.
“That was nine years ago.”
“You told me the fire damaged me internally.”
“It did.”
“You performed tests.”
“Yes.”
“Where are they?”
Vale did not answer.
Desmond leaned on his cane.
“I requested my complete medical records seven years ago. The fertility panels were missing.”
“Records get lost.”
“Mine don’t.”
Josie watched Vale’s hands.
The doctor looked composed.
His fingers did not.
They trembled.
Vale lowered his voice.
“You need to leave.”
“I asked a question.”
“I have patients.”
Desmond stepped closer.
“You had one patient who trusted you.”
Vale’s face hardened.
“And that patient was involved in a criminal organization that frightened everyone who worked in the hospital.”
Josie looked at Desmond.
He did not react.
Vale continued.
“You were unconscious for nearly four days. There were men in the halls. Police outside the building. Reporters downstairs.”
“And that changed my blood work?”
“No.”
“Then answer me.”
Vale’s eyes moved toward Josie again.
Desmond noticed.
“Say it in front of her.”
“I can’t.”
“You can.”
Vale whispered, “There are things you don’t understand about that fire.”
Desmond’s expression turned cold.
“I understand that thirteen people died.”
Josie’s stomach tightened.
“Fourteen,” Vale said.
The silence afterward seemed impossible.
Desmond stared at him.
“What?”
“Fourteen.”
“The official count was thirteen.”
“I know.”
“Who was fourteen?”
Vale closed his eyes.
When he opened them, fear had replaced hesitation.
“I’m not discussing this here.”
Desmond’s voice sharpened.
“Who?”
Vale stepped around his desk.
“The fertility diagnosis was wrong.”
Josie stopped breathing.
Desmond did not move.
Vale continued.
“You were not sterile.”
The room seemed to tilt.
Desmond’s hand tightened around his cane.
“You lied.”
“I signed a false report.”
“Why?”
Vale looked toward the hallway.
“Because someone told me that if Desmond Ror believed he could father children, more people would die.”
Desmond’s face became unreadable.
“Who?”
Vale shook his head.
“I can’t tell you.”
“You can.”
“I have a family.”
“So do I,” Josie said quietly.
Both men turned toward her.
“My son is under your care. If whatever happened nine years ago has anything to do with him, I need to know.”
Vale looked stricken.
“It doesn’t.”
“Then why did you react when you saw his file?”
“I reacted because Desmond walked into my office.”
Desmond took another step.
Vale backed away.
“You should go,” the doctor said.
Desmond’s voice dropped.
“Adrian.”
Vale swallowed.
Then he whispered a name.
“Edmund Quillin.”
Josie did not recognize it.
Desmond did.
He stared as if Vale had struck him.
“Bernadette’s husband?”
Vale nodded.
“He was alive after the fire.”
Desmond’s breathing stopped.
“That’s impossible.”
“I treated him.”
“Edmund died in Kesler.”
“No. He survived.”
“Where?”
Vale looked toward the door.
“I don’t know.”
“You’re lying.”
“I swear.”
Desmond’s voice became rough.
“Bernadette buried an empty coffin?”
Vale whispered, “Yes.”
Outside the office, a cart rolled past.
A nurse laughed somewhere.
The ordinary hospital continued functioning as if the world inside the room had not just changed.
Desmond finally asked, “Why did Edmund want me to believe I was sterile?”
Vale shook his head.
“He wasn’t protecting you from becoming a father.”
“What was he protecting?”
Vale looked straight at him.
“A child who already existed.”
Desmond did not speak.
Josie felt cold.
“What child?” she asked.
Vale’s eyes filled with regret.
“That is all I know.”
Desmond turned and left.
Josie followed him into the corridor.
“Desmond.”
He kept walking.
Tap.
Drag.
Tap.
Drag.
“Desmond.”
He stopped beside an empty waiting room.
His face had gone gray.
“Bernadette told me Edmund died saving workers.”
Josie spoke carefully.
“Maybe she believes that.”
“He was her husband.”
“She may have been lied to too.”
Desmond looked at her.
Something raw had entered his eyes.
“My uncle died in that fire. My body burned. Fourteen people apparently died. A doctor falsified my medical records. And now I’m being told a dead man survived and hid a child.”
Josie lowered her voice.
“We don’t know whose child.”
He stared at the floor.
“No.”
But his voice suggested he had already imagined the answer.
Toby’s transfusion took almost three hours.
Desmond stayed.
He sat in the corner of the room reading messages on his phone.
Toby watched him.
“You look angry.”
Desmond looked up.
“I’m thinking.”
“My mom says that too when she’s angry.”
Josie groaned.
“Toby.”
Desmond almost smiled.
The boy held up Flight 41.
“Want to throw it?”
“In a hospital?”
“Hallway’s long.”
Josie started to object.
Desmond stood.
“Once.”
Toby grinned.
They went to the quiet end of the corridor.
Desmond sat in a chair.
Toby adjusted the airplane.
“Hold it here.”
Desmond copied him.
“Not too hard.”
“I’m aware of basic physics.”
“You throw like an old man.”
Josie covered her mouth.
Desmond stared at Toby.
Then laughed.
It was only one sound.
Low.
Unexpected.
But Josie heard it.
And for reasons she could not explain, it hurt.
Because she realized how long it had probably been since anyone had made that sound come from him.
They returned to the estate after dark.
Bernadette waited in the kitchen.
Desmond entered first.
“We went to see Adrian Vale.”
The older woman dropped the cup in her hand.
It did not break.
“Who?”
“Don’t.”
Bernadette looked at Josie.
Then at Toby.
“Take the boy downstairs.”
Josie hesitated.
Desmond nodded.
She took Toby to the breakfast room.
But the mansion carried sound.
Especially anger.
She heard Desmond’s voice through the ceiling.
“YOU KNEW?”
Then Bernadette crying.
Josie had never heard her cry.
Nearly an hour passed.
Desmond eventually appeared in the hallway.
His face was rigid.
“Take Toby home.”
Josie stood.
“What happened?”
“Tomorrow.”
“You keep saying tomorrow.”
“Because tonight I may say something I regret.”
That stopped her.
She nodded.
At the door he handed Toby the paper airplane.
Toby looked at him.
“Are you sad?”
Desmond did not answer.
Toby hugged him.
No warning.
No permission.
The small boy wrapped both arms around Desmond’s waist.
Desmond froze.
Then slowly placed one scarred hand against Toby’s back.
Josie looked away.
Not from discomfort.
To give him privacy.
When she looked again, Desmond’s eyes were wet.
The following morning, Bernadette was gone.
Her room had been emptied.
On Desmond’s desk sat one envelope.
Inside was an old photograph.
A burned building.
Four people standing in front of it before construction began.
Young Desmond.
His uncle.
Edmund Quillin.
And a woman Josie had never seen.
On the back, someone had written:
If Desmond ever learns the truth, tell him the baby survived.
Underneath was a date.
Seven years and eleven months before Toby was born.
And beneath the date, a single name.
Evelyn Marlo.
May you like
Josie’s mother.
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