Chapter 8 - Michael Asked For A Real Test Before Sunset
After carrying Sophie through the cemetery doors, Michael stopped beneath a covered stone walkway.
She was still holding him around the neck.
The four older children stood several yards away with me.
Michael looked at them again.
Not as strangers.
Not as evidence of betrayal.
As children he had once known so well he could identify each one by footsteps in a hallway.
Our eldest son had Michael’s ears.
Our middle daughter had the Bennett dimple.
Another son had the same way of standing with one foot angled outward.
Sophie pressed her face into his neck exactly the way she had as a toddler.
Michael started crying.
Not loudly.
I had almost forgotten what his real grief looked like.
He lowered Sophie carefully.
Then came toward me.
“Nora.”
I stepped back.
He stopped.
Good.
At least he understood he no longer had automatic access to my space.
“I want testing.”
I stared at him.
“Now?”
“Legal. Chain of custody. Everything.”
“You had that option three years ago.”
“I know.”
“No, Michael. You don’t get to say two words and make the last three years disappear.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
His face broke.
“I don’t know what I know anymore.”
That, finally, was honest.
I told him my attorney would handle it.
No private kits.
No samples stored in his office.
No Vanessa.
No shortcuts.
An accredited laboratory.
Documented collection.
Identification.
Separate witnesses.
Michael agreed to every condition.
He looked toward Sophie.
Then whispered:
“If I was wrong…”
I interrupted him.
“You were wrong before the test.”
He looked at me.
May you like
“You abandoned children who loved you before you had evidence strong enough to justify destroying their world. Whatever DNA says, that part is already true.”
He had no answer.
