Marcus looked at him.
“Most likely her uncle.”
The word detonated inside the room.
Uncle.
A memory surfaced.
A lake house in New Hampshire.
Nine months before the divorce.
Derek had supposedly been in New York.
I drove alone to the Mercer family’s lake property after receiving devastating news from a fertility specialist.
Someone else was there.
Derek’s older brother.
Jonathan Mercer.
The family rarely mentioned him.
Jonathan had left Massachusetts after a brutal fight with their father more than a decade earlier.
I had met him only several times.
That night, however, he stayed.
I cried.
He listened.
We drank tea.
A storm cut the electricity.
We sat beside the fireplace talking until after midnight.
He told me the Mercer men had been taught to confuse control with love.
I eventually fell asleep on the sofa.
When I woke, Jonathan was asleep in an armchair.
Nothing happened.
I knew nothing happened.
“Absolutely not,” I said.
Marcus nodded.
“I know.”
“Then why would the test say—”
“There’s more.”
I almost laughed.
Of course there was.
Marcus explained that because of complications during Evelyn’s delivery, the hospital requested old medical records connected to my previous fertility treatments.
The records didn’t match.
Seven years earlier, during one of our IVF cycles, the clinic had fertilized my eggs using a genetic sample that did not belong to Derek.
It belonged to Jonathan.
Derek stared at Marcus.
“What?”
“Jonathan donated sperm anonymously in his twenties. Long before Rachel became a patient.”
“That makes no sense.”
“The clinic mislabeled a sample.”
My hands went cold.
Seven years earlier.
I remembered that cycle.
Two embryos.
One transfer.
A positive pregnancy test.
Eleven weeks of hope.
Then bleeding.
Emergency surgery.
A physician holding my hand and telling me there was nothing they could do.
“That pregnancy ended.”
Marcus nodded carefully.
“That is what you were told.”
I stared at him.
“What does that mean?”
“The clinic records show two viable embryos were created from Jonathan’s mislabeled sample.”
“One was transferred to me.”
“Yes.”
“And the other?”
“Frozen.”
Derek stepped closer.
“What happened to it?”
Marcus’s silence terrified me.
“It was transferred several years later.”
“To whom?”
Marcus looked at us both.
“Sloane Avery.”
The room disappeared for a second.
Derek gripped the back of a chair.
“What?”
“Sloane underwent fertility treatment through another branch associated with the same clinic.”
“She told me she never wanted children.”
“She may not initially have known the embryo’s origin.”
Derek looked sick.
“Did she have the baby?”
“Yes.”
I stared at Marcus.
“Where?”
“Male child. Born almost three years ago.”
Derek’s voice cracked.
“Where is he?”
“The original file lists a private adoption arrangement.”
“And?”
“The adoption apparently never occurred.”
“Then where is he?”
Marcus said quietly, “Sloane kept him.”
My mind raced backward.
Three years earlier, Sloane had disappeared from work for five months.
She told us she was undergoing treatment for endometriosis.
I had sent her flowers.
I remembered writing the card.
Take all the time you need.
My stomach turned.
“Sloane had a child while working for me?”
Marcus nodded.
“Her mother has apparently been caring for him outside Providence.”
Suddenly every event rearranged itself.
The affair.
The obsession with Derek.
The fake pregnancy.
Caleb’s financial maneuvering.
The rush to get me divorced.
The wedding.
Maybe none of it had begun with love.
Derek whispered, “She knew the boy was connected to my family.”
“At some point, yes.”
Marcus’s phone rang.
He checked the screen.
Then looked at us.
“Federal agents detained Sloane downstairs.”
Derek shut his eyes.
“They searched her car.”
“What did they find?” I asked.
“Medical records.”
“Whose?”
Marcus looked at me.
“Yours.”
My entire body went numb.
“Fertility records. Genetic reports. Archived clinic documents.”
Derek whispered, “She knew.”
“Yes.”
Another knock came.
Two investigators entered.
Behind them was a woman in her late fifties holding the hand of a small boy.
Dark hair.
Gray-blue eyes.
And above his left eyebrow—
a crescent-shaped birthmark.
Derek stood so fast his chair fell backward.
The woman swallowed.
“My name is Diane Avery.”
Sloane’s mother.
The boy hid against her leg.
“This is Owen.”
I couldn’t breathe.
Diane looked at me.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“Sloane told me his biological father was dead.”
Derek covered his mouth.
