Chapter 3 - MAYA’S TOESThe emergency physician told us Maya was lucky.
Mild hypothermia.
Early cold injury to several toes.
No frostbite requiring surgery.
No permanent tissue damage expected.
Expected.
I held onto that word.
She had been outside approximately eleven minutes.
Not five.
Doorbell-camera timestamps from the house across the street later established that.
Eleven minutes is not a dramatic eternity.
It is still a long time for a seven-year-old in socks during a Nebraska winter night.
Caleb sat on the other side of the hospital room.
He looked sick.
Maya slept.
I said:
“Tell me.”
He rubbed his hands together.
“Not here.”
I stared.
He corrected himself.
“Okay.”
Good.
“Trent is Mom’s son.”
“I understood half-brother.”
“From before she married Dad.”
“Why have I never heard his name?”
Caleb looked toward Maya.
Then back.
“Because I didn’t want him near us.”
“Why?”
A pause.
“Because he ruins things.”
Not enough.
“What does that mean?”
“Rachel.”
“No.”
He closed his eyes.
“When I was fifteen, he stole Dad’s truck.”
“What else?”
“Money.”
“What else?”
“Prescription pills from Mom.”
“What else?”
“He got violent when people cornered him.”
My skin went cold in a room already too cold.
“And your mother let him near Maya.”
“I didn’t know.”
“Did you know he was back in Nebraska?”
Caleb did not answer.
There.
“Caleb.”
“Yes.”
I stood.
The chair scraped.
Maya stirred.
I immediately lowered my voice.
“How long?”
“Two weeks.”
I looked at my sleeping daughter.
Then at my husband.
“You knew for two weeks that a violent man your mother hides from the family was back here, and you didn’t tell me?”
“I didn’t know he was at Mom’s.”
May you like
“That isn’t my question.”
He had no answer.
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