Thomas sat directly to my left.

Ryan finally looked up, his eyes resting on his father.

“Are you really doing this, Dad?” Ryan asked, his voice dripping with disbelief. “You’re taking her side?”

“I’m taking the side of the woman who almost died on my watch,” Thomas said.

“Quiet, please,” Henderson, Ryan’s lawyer, said.

He was an older man with bags under his eyes and a weary expression.

The court reporter sat at the end of the table, her fingers poised over her machine.

She administered the oath, and Ryan swore to tell the truth.

Helen Vance leaned forward, resting her forearms on the polished wood.

“Mr. Parker,” Helen began. “Let’s start with the evening of October fourteenth.”

“Fine,” Ryan said.

“You had a trip planned to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, for your thirtieth birthday?”

“Yes. My friends had rented a cabin.”

“What time did you plan to leave the house?”

“Around eight in the evening,” Ryan said.

“And your wife, Emma, was two weeks postpartum at the time?”

“Yes.”

“Did you check on her before you left?”