I Was the Genius Couple's Forgotten Bride novel · Chapter 18 of 24

Chapter 18: Next Door

The Franes' house was the yellow one next to ours, with the white fence I had climbed a thousand times.

On Sunday morning I walked up the front path with Calvin's recorder in my coat pocket.

I rang the bell.

Lydia's father opened the door himself, in a gray cardigan, with his reading glasses pushed up on his forehead.

"Nessa," he said warmly. "Look at you. Come in, come in. We've been expecting you."

"You have?"

"Lydia called last night. She said you'd have questions."

His wife was in the sunroom with a pot of tea and did not get up.

She raised one hand to me and went on pouring.

I sat at their dining table, because he pulled out the chair.

I took the recorder out of my pocket, set it on the white tablecloth, and pressed the switch.

The red light came on.

He looked at it with mild interest.

"It's recording," I said. "I'm telling you so there's no confusion."

"Calvin's, isn't it? He's never without it." He sat down across from me and folded his hands. "Go ahead, Nessa. I've nothing to hide. The protocol was reviewed and approved. Your mother consented in writing."

"She signed something on her porch with a clipboard."

"She signed an informed consent form."

"Did she get a copy?"

"There was a copy for the file."

"She didn't read it."

"That's a decision she made," Lydia's father said kindly. "I'm not responsible for what people choose not to read."

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