“It cannot be,” I said, but the detective slid a photo across the table showing Brooke Sinclair, Ryan’s current wife.
My hands trembled uncontrollably as I whispered, “His wife,” and Detective Cole nodded with quiet certainty.
They explained she had used a falsified badge to enter the NICU, and nobody connected it at the time because Mason’s death had already been labeled genetic.
That night I sat alone in my apartment with every light turned on, and at 9:14 my phone rang again.
Ryan’s name appeared on the screen, and when I answered he asked without greeting, “Why did the hospital contact you?”
I walked to the window and said, “They discovered Mason was not sick, because someone poisoned him,” and the silence that followed was heavier than anything he could have said.
When I told him Brooke was responsible, his immediate response was not shock but denial, and he said, “You do not understand her, she would never hurt a child.”
That sentence unsettled me more than anything else, and I asked quietly, “Did you ever love him enough to consider someone else could have harmed him.”