She was wearing a long, dark coat, her head bowed against the chilly wind.

She carried a thick white envelope in her hands.

My phone vibrated in my palm again, a text message lighting up the screen.

It was an image file from an unknown number.

I tapped the screen to open it.

The image was a scanned document, a laboratory report from a prenatal clinic.

As the image slowly loaded from top to bottom, my eyes locked on the section labeled *Paternal Probability*.

Before I could read the final percentage, a floorboard creaked in the hallway downstairs.

I froze.

The front door had not opened.

The garage door had not made a sound.

But someone was in the house.

I held my breath and listened.

The house fell completely quiet again, save for the hum of the refrigerator in the kitchen downstairs.

My heart hammered against my ribs as I looked back out the window.

Rose was still standing by her faded blue sedan, her head bowed against the wind.

She had not moved.