“I hope I’m not calling too late,” Lake said. “It’s Lake Warren.”
“Oh, hey. I was going to touch base tomorrow. What’s up?”
“I was attacked tonight. And I think it had to do with the clinic. I—I was just hoping I could talk to you. To be honest, I’m scared out of my mind.”
“Are you hurt?” he asked, sounding alarmed. “Have you seen a doctor?”
“I’m okay. Just shaken. And I ended up in the East River, so I’m sopping wet.”
“The river? My God. Where are you?”
“I’m in my car—in Chelsea. I don’t really know what to do.”
“I’m in the Village on Jane Street, so I’m not far. Will you be able to drive down here? Or should I come and get you?”
She could feel the relief wash over her. He was going to help her.
“No, I’ll be okay driving down there.”
He suggested a garage near his building, since street parking was next to impossible in his neighborhood.
“Why don’t you call me when you get to the garage and I’ll come meet you,” he added.
“That’s not necessary,” she said. “Just give me your address and I’ll see you in a few minutes. And…thank you.”
To her surprise he was waiting in the garage when she arrived, dressed in khakis and a rumpled blue-and-white striped dress shirt. As soon as she stepped out of the car, he shook his head in distress at the sight of her.
“I’m just half a block up the street,” he said. He put his arm lightly on her back and guided her along the sidewalk. The street was dark, the streetlamps partly obscured by rows of leafy plane trees, and the whole way there she could sense how alert he was, cocking his head back and forth as he checked around them. He had his keys out before they were even at his brownstone. After letting her into his ground-floor apartment, he glanced up and down the street before he shut the door.
“So tell me what happened,” he said as soon as he’d ushered her into his living room. It was a large, comfortable space with a big red sofa and books and newspapers strewn all over its surfaces.
“A man attacked me in one of the river parks in Dumbo,” Lake said. “He knocked me down and then he pulled out a knife. I know it sounds crazy, but the only way I could escape was to jump in the river. I swam over to an area beneath a park and hid there until I was pretty sure he was gone.”
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yes—but it was pretty hairy for a while,” she said, her voice catching. “I’m a good swimmer but I don’t know how long I could have lasted out there. I was afraid I’d get tired and the tide would sweep me away.”
Then without warning, she began to cry. Her shoulders shook, and she let out a weird strangled sound. It was partly from relief, she knew—and partly from despair, because though she’d escaped, she wasn’t safe at all.
“Hey,” Archer said gently and put his arm around her, pulling her toward him. Her right cheek pressed against his soft rumpled shirt. “Everything’s okay now.”
“I don’t think so,” Lake said, brushing her tears away. “I think someone from the clinic is after me. They want to shut me up.”
“Tell me why you think that,” he said.
“Look,” she said, “I hope you won’t be mad, but I tracked down Alexis Hunt myself. I wanted to find out what she thought was happening there. I figured if I was going to wade through the files, it would help to know what I was looking for.”
“Okay,” he said, drawing out the word. He’d turned his head and was looking at her sideways, his eyes skeptical.
“What she told me was pretty staggering,” Lake said. “She’s convinced that the clinic transferred her embryos to someone else—a woman named Melanie Turnbull. Sometimes couples give permission for this but Alexis definitely didn’t. She says it resulted in this woman having a baby—and that she probably didn’t realize it was from a donor embryo. Needless to say, Alexis is beside herself.”
Archer opened his mouth in surprise.
“Wow, there was a case like that years ago in California. But could this have been a mistake? Embryos accidentally switched in the lab?”
“No, it all just seems too suspicious. The clinic likes to boast about how successful they are with older women. I think they’re doing this to improve their numbers with women over forty. Plus,