Chapter 3 - The Ghost of Bernie
The pieces were beginning to align into something ugly and dark.
"Clara Vance told me there was no body to recover because the river was too high," Elena said, her voice dropping into a dangerous whisper. "I spent two years in therapy. I almost took my own life, Daniel. The guilt... the feeling that I let go of his small hand... it nearly destroyed me. The only reason I kept going was because an old neighborhood woman named Rosa gave me these two red braided bracelets. She said, 'One for you, one for the angel in heaven. Keep yours until you find peace.'"
She reached out and gently touched Mateo’s wrist. "I didn't know Rosa had made a matching pair for the baby before the storm. And I didn't know he wasn't in heaven."
Mateo pulled the cloudy plastic sleeve out of his pocket and handed it to me. "Bernie gave it to me before he got real sick."
I took the plastic sleeve carefully. Inside was a piece of yellowed lined notebook paper, stained with dried mud and water spots. Written in shaky, blue ballpoint pen was a short, precise message:
August 24, 2018. Found this boy floating in a plastic tote tub near the pecan grove after the flood. He was wearing a red braided string. Clara Vance offered me five hundred bucks to hand him over without calling the cops. She said his mama was dead and he’d go to a good rich family in San Antonio. I knew Clara was lying. I kept the boy. Named him Mateo after my brother. If anyone finds this, Clara Vance runs an illegal placement ring out of the Del Rio county office. - Bernie O’Malley.
My blood ran cold as I read the words.
"Bernie took care of me in his cabin by the lake," Mateo whispered, looking up at me with big, round eyes. "He taught me how to fish. But two weeks ago, some bad men came to the cabin. They took Bernie away in an ambulance, and then Deputy Vance came and put me in a blue van. He said I was going to a shelter."
"How did you get here, sweetie?" Elena asked, pulling him into a tight embrace.
"I hid in the caterer's truck at the gas station," Mateo said simply. "I saw the white flowers on the side of the truck. Bernie told me if I ever got away from Vance, I should look for the fancy places where people wear dresses, because Clara Vance’s rich friends liked those places. And then... I saw her red thread."
My mother sat down on the edge of her armchair, her face pale, all her hostility evaporating into sheer horror. "My God... they stole a child."
"They didn't just steal him," I said, standing up and pulling out my phone. "They sold him. Or tried to. And now that Bernie is gone, Clara and her deputy brother are trying to erase the paper trail before anyone realizes Mateo is alive."
I dialed my chief corporate counsel, Arthur Vance—no relation to the deputy, thank God—a ruthless former federal prosecutor who had handled my firm’s international contracts for a decade.
"Arthur," I said when he answered on the third ring. "I need you at my estate immediately. Bring a judge who can sign an emergency custody order, two federal marshals, and a forensic investigator."
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"Daniel?" Arthur sounded confused. "It’s eight-thirty on a Saturday. Weren't you getting married?"
"The wedding is paused," I said, looking at Elena holding her son against her chest, both of them crying tears of relief and exhaustion. "Right now, I’m going to war."
