Kenneth arranged for me to meet Evan Mercer the next afternoon.
Not alone.
Not informally.
And definitely not at my house.
We met in a conference room at Kenneth’s office with glass walls facing downtown. Rain clouds hung low over the buildings, flattening the afternoon light.
Evan arrived ten minutes early.
He was taller than I remembered from the hospital, perhaps thirty-five, with dark hair cut short and the tired posture of someone who had not slept properly in days.
He did not try to shake my hand.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“For what?”
“For walking into something that clearly had nothing to do with me.”
Kenneth closed the conference-room door.
“I suspect it has quite a lot to do with you.”
Evan sat.
I remained standing for another moment before taking the chair across from him.
“Did you know Melinda was married?”
“She wasn’t.”
“No. She was sleeping with my husband.”
His eyes dropped.
“I didn’t know that either.”
Kenneth placed a legal pad on the table.
“Start from the beginning.”
Evan nodded.
He had met Melinda at a fundraising event in May, nearly two years earlier. She had introduced herself as single.
They began seeing each other within a week.
“How often?” Kenneth asked.
“Two or three times a week.”
“And this continued through?”
“October.”
I looked at him.
“Noah was conceived around June.”
“I know.”
His voice was quiet.
“When did you learn she was pregnant?”
“July.”
“What did she tell you?”
“That it couldn’t be mine.”
“Why?”
“She said she had been with someone else.”
Connor.
The word did not need to be spoken.
Evan reached into his bag.
Kenneth immediately stopped him.
“What are you taking out?”
“My phone.”
“Put it on the table.”
Evan did.
He opened an archived conversation.
“I saved everything after she contacted me last month.”
“Last month?”
That surprised me.
Evan looked at me.
“She contacted me first.”
He turned the screen.
The message was dated February 11.
Evan, I need to know whether you ever told anyone about us.
Another followed.
Especially anything about June.
Kenneth photographed the screen.
“What did you answer?”
“That I hadn’t.”
“Was that true?”
“Yes.”
“Why contact you after almost two years?”
“I didn’t know.”
“Until today?”
Evan nodded.
“I saw the baby.”
Something in his voice changed.
Not certainty.
Recognition.
“I know babies resemble everybody and nobody,” he continued. “I’m not claiming a photograph proves anything. But Noah looks exactly like my brother did at that age.”
Kenneth asked, “Why were you at the hospital yesterday?”
“My mother had surgery.”
“And seeing Melinda was accidental?”
“Completely.”
I believed him.
Not because I trusted him.
Because Melinda’s reaction had been too immediate to fake.
Evan scrolled farther.
“There’s another message.”
This one was from the year Noah was born.
Melinda had written:
Please don’t contact me again. Everything is settled now.
Evan’s response:
Settled how?
There had been no answer.
Kenneth leaned back.
“When did you learn about Connor?”
“Yesterday.”
“How?”
“I searched Melinda online after seeing her.”
“And Kirsten?”
“The same way.”
Evan looked uncomfortable.
“I’m sorry.”
I had heard those words from strangers more sincerely than I had heard them from my own husband.
“What do you want?” I asked.
He looked at me.
“If Noah is mine, I want to know.”
“And if he isn’t?”
“Then I disappear.”
There was no drama in the answer.
That made it more convincing.
Kenneth gathered the printed filings.
“Connor’s attorney has already requested expedited testing.”
Evan nodded.
“My lawyer agreed.”
I turned toward Kenneth.
“How fast?”
“A private accredited laboratory can return results within days once samples are collected.”
My heartbeat shifted.
Days.
Not months.
The truth that had been hidden inside Noah’s existence for a year could become a number on a page before the week ended.
Evan left twenty minutes later.
Kenneth waited until the door closed.
“You believe him,” I said.
“I believe his records deserve verification.”
“That wasn’t what I asked.”
Kenneth gave me the faintest smile.
“You’ve known me too long.”
“Yes.”
“I think Melinda lied to both men.”
I looked through the glass wall.
“And me.”
“Yes.”
My phone vibrated.
Connor.
I turned it over.
Kenneth’s expression changed.
“What?”
“He keeps calling.”
“Block him.”
“I thought you wanted records.”
“We have records. We don’t need harassment.”
I blocked the number.
It felt surprisingly easy.
Then Kenneth slid another document toward me.
“I obtained something this morning.”
The page contained a series of financial transfers.
I recognized Connor’s old investment account immediately.
“What is this?”
“Money moving after your separation.”
I scanned the entries.
Thirty thousand.
Twenty-five thousand.
Fifty thousand.
All within four months.
Recipient names meant nothing to me.
“What does this have to do with Noah?”
“Possibly nothing.”
Kenneth tapped the third line.
“Look at the date.”
June 28.
The same June.
The same window in which Noah was likely conceived.
“What am I looking at?”
“A payment to a private fertility and reproductive clinic.”
My throat tightened.
“That could be treatment.”
“It could.”
“For Connor?”
“Possibly.”
“Then why hide it?”
Kenneth did not answer.
I looked again.
$18,600.
Two weeks later, another payment.
$9,400.
Then a refund.
Then a transfer to Melinda.
I stared at her name.
“Connor paid her?”
“Fifty thousand dollars.”
“When?”
“Three days after the refund.”
I felt the room narrow.
“Why?”
“We don’t know.”
“Did this come from the assets he concealed during our divorce?”
“Yes.”
That mattered.
Even if Noah had never existed, Connor had hidden substantial marital assets. Kenneth had already traced more than seven hundred thousand dollars that should have been disclosed.
Now those accounts were telling a second story.
“What was the clinic?”
“Westbridge Reproductive Medicine.”
I knew the name.
Not personally.
Professionally.
“They handle male-factor infertility.”
“Among other things.”
I stared at him.
“You think Connor was getting treatment.”
“I think we need records before concluding anything.”
“What does Melinda have to do with that?”
“That is exactly the question.”
My phone vibrated despite Connor being blocked.
A message arrived from Melinda.
Please, Kirsten. Woman to woman. We need to talk before lawyers destroy all of us.
I almost handed the phone to Kenneth.
Then another message appeared.
Connor doesn’t know everything.
Kenneth read it over my shoulder.
“Still don’t answer.”
I forwarded it.
Ten minutes later, Melinda sent a photograph.
It showed a sheet of paper.
Most of it was obscured by her thumb, but the heading was visible.
WESTBRIDGE REPRODUCTIVE MEDICINE.
Below it was a date.
June 19.
And beneath the date:
FLEMING, CONNOR.
I enlarged the photograph.
There was another name farther down the page.
Only the first letters were visible.
MEL—
My pulse thudded.
“Kenneth.”
“I see it.”
Another message arrived.
I never meant for you to find out this way.
Then:
He told me you already knew.
I looked at Kenneth.
“Knew what?”
Before he could answer, Melinda sent one final message.
Ask Connor why my name was on his fertility paperwork before you two were divorced.
Click here to continue reading: PART 7: WHAT CONNOR HAD PURCHASED
Sixteen Days After Walter Died, His Hospice Nurse Called With a Name I Had Never Heard Before
Part 6 of 20
