When the Bough Breaks (Rose Gardner Investigations #6) - Denise Grover Swank Page 0,44
the baby’s room, to feel the assurance that he or she would soon be coming home.
I hoped we found the kids before the baby was born. Of course, we couldn’t find them soon enough to suit me, but selfishly, I didn’t want the baby to be born while we were still so upset and worried. Despite Mike’s resistance, my daydreams about the baby had always included my niece and nephew.
I couldn’t even let myself think about where they were, who they were with, or what was happening to them. I had to stop midflight up the stairs as a wave of dizziness hit me, and Muffy began whining at my feet.
“I’m okay, girl. Just so, so worried.”
After my head cleared, I climbed the rest of the stairs, then walked to the end of the hall and turned right into the baby’s nursery.
The walls were sage green, decorated with white birch trees, which Neely Kate and I had painted a month before. The crib and dresser had arrived shortly afterward, and Joe and I had spent a weekend assembling the furniture and putting everything in its place.
It was hard to believe that our baby would be sleeping in the crib within a few weeks.
I sat in the rocking chair—the chair that had been in my own nursery, which I’d only gotten to use for a few weeks before the death of my birth mother. Joe had painted it white, and Neely Kate and I had added a seat and back cushion, and sometimes I liked to sit in the chair and imagine holding my baby.
I started to drift off to sleep, but then my phone buzzed with an incoming email. When I saw it was from Mr. Gilliam, I opened it.
Rose, attached is a statement that shows the balance on Violet’s account, including what was paid and what is still owed. Keep in mind, it reflects Violet’s full stay at MD Anderson, including her chemo and radiation treatments. Let me know if I can do anything else to help.
Regards,
Gary Gilliam
My stomach in knots, I opened the attached file and zoomed in, and nearly vomited when I saw the total.
Mike owed four hundred and seventy-three thousand dollars. And fifteen cents.
While I’d known the insurance through the nursery wasn’t great, and that they’d been reluctant to cover the bone marrow transplant, I had no idea the balance was this bad. How on earth could he pay off such a debt? But the simple truth was he couldn’t. He’d be forced to declare bankruptcy and lose everything.
No wonder Mike had been so bitter about Vi’s choice to move in with me. No wonder he hated me for getting—aside from Neely Kate’s inheritance of a third of the nursery—every last one of her assets.
Mike was in deep, deep debt. Had Hardshaw offered him money to help him out of it?
What on earth had they asked him to do?
I called Joe, but he didn’t answer, so I left him a message saying that Mr. Gilliam had sent me information about the small fortune Mike owed for Vi’s medical bills. I followed up by forwarding him the email.
Suddenly, everything felt like too much.
Muffy and I went into my room and both of us settled in for a nap, Muffy jumping up beside me on the bed, her small body curling against mine. A few hours later, I woke up stiff and groggy, but I forced myself to get out of bed. I had several texts. One from Neely Kate saying they’d found some cash deposits, but they weren’t sure who they were from. I texted her back, letting her know about Mike’s debt, and then forwarded the email from the lawyer to both her and Mason, chastising myself for not having sent the information to them sooner. The more people who were looking for Ashley and Mikey, the better. The other text was from Joe, thanking me for the email, saying it was more helpful than I knew.
It was after six, time to go. I knew I should eat something, but I was too nervous, so I grabbed a container of leftover pasta and told Muffy she had to stay behind. While James and Muffy had gotten along, he’d never fallen in love with her like Joe and Mason had. While I wanted to believe he wouldn’t hurt her to get to me, I couldn’t be completely sure. Everyone said James had changed since I’d last seen him.