The Choices We Made novel · Chapter 15 of 24

Chapter 15: The Garden at Midnight

Weston was out of the room before the screen went dark.

Eliza heard him on the stairs, calling for the night guard.

She stayed where she was, because Albie was asleep and someone had to be the wall between him and the window.

She pulled the curtain back an inch.

Gretchen stood on the lawn in a pale coat with a ladder at her feet and a duffel bag over her shoulder.

She was looking straight up at Albie's window.

She had a stuffed dinosaur in her arms.

Eliza recorded her through the glass.

The floodlights snapped on across the grass, and the guard ran from the side of the house, with Weston behind him.

"Gretchen," Weston said. "Put the ladder down."

"Wes, thank God." She smiled at him, bright and cracked. "I came to get him before your mother does something worse."

"My mother is not the one at my son's window at midnight."

"He's my boy too!"

The bedroom door creaked behind Eliza.

She turned.

Albie stood at the foot of his bed in the dark, with his blanket dragged behind him.

"Mommy?"

"Go back to bed, baby."

"Is Syd outside?"

He walked to the window before she could stop him.

Eliza knelt and held him, and let him see.

Gretchen looked up, and her whole face changed.

"Albie!" She lifted the dinosaur. "Baby, come down! I have your dinosaur, and we're going to the beach house like I promised."

Albie put his palm on the glass.

"No," he said.

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