Chapter 9: Four-Four-Eight-One

"That's kind of you," I told Brynn on the phone.

Winslow lay beside me with his eyes closed, listening to every word.

"Take the swabs, and take the hotel's medical man in the car with you."

"Of course," said Brynn warmly. "Whatever makes you comfortable."

"And Mr. Taft's assistant will photograph both tubes before they leave the building."

There was a pause so short I almost missed it.

"Photographs are a wonderful idea," said Brynn.

She hung up.

Winslow opened one eye.

"You don't trust her."

"I don't trust anybody who's that happy to be checked."

By four o'clock that afternoon, I sat in Dalton's office on the top floor of the hotel.

Winslow sat beside me, and the whole family was around us.

Mr. Livingstone sat by the window.

Mrs. Livingstone sat on a sofa, twisting a handkerchief.

The cardiologist, the pilot and the youngest leaned on the wall.

Colton stood at Dalton's shoulder.

Brynn sat in an armchair with her hands folded and her eyes red.

She looked like she had been up all night worrying about me.

A courier from the clinic put a sealed envelope on Dalton's desk and left.

Dalton slit it open with a letter knife.

He read it once.

He read it again, and something in his face relaxed.

"No relation," he said.

The pilot whooped.

"Probability of paternity, zero percent," Dalton read.

"Same as the one in the lobby yesterday. Coralie Marsh is not our father's daughter."

"I told you," said Colton. "I told you she was a plant."

"She's not a plant," said Brynn, wiping her eyes. "She's just mistaken. Oh, Coralie."

Mrs. Livingstone made a sound.

I did not move.

I had known what it would say.

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