Chapter 16: The Drawer

The caseworker spoke to Miles for twenty minutes behind the bedroom door.

Marcello and I stood in the corridor, a foot apart, and neither of us sat down.

"She'll see through it," he said. "The complaint is a smear."

"She's seen a hundred smears."

"Then why are my hands shaking?"

I looked down.

They were.

The door opened. The caseworker came out with her folder shut and her face unreadable.

"Mr. Ferraro. Ms. Hargrove."

"Is he all right?" I said.

"He's fine. He told me his mother is the best lawyer in New York, and his father paid a library fine."

Marcello made a sound I had never heard from him.

"He also told me he is allowed to say no to his father," the woman went on.

"And that you have never asked him for anything he said no to."

"That's the arrangement," I said.

"It's an unusual one." She looked at Marcello. "I can close this complaint. I need two things within forty-eight hours."

"Name them."

"Proof that you are the legal father and that the child's address is stable. The marriage certificate and the birth certificate, not copies."

"They're in my study," Marcello said. "At home."

"Then bring them."

She left.

Downstairs, a wall of cameras waited on the pavement in the cold.

Marcello stopped at the lobby doors.

"Stay inside."

"Marcello."

"Please. This part is mine."

He went out alone. I stood behind the glass.

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