My wife sl@pped my five-year-old daughter for touching a piece of bread, so I struck her back.

Ruth's lawyer was a woman named Patricia Hale.

She arrived at nine the next morning in a gray coat and flat shoes, carrying a leather folder and a small digital recorder of her own.

She shook my hand, said very little, and sat down at the kitchen table like she had been there before.

I set Mason's watch-recorder in front of her.

"My stepson made this," I said.

"Over several months."

She looked at it.

"How old is he?"

"Seven."

She picked it up carefully.

"Has anyone else listened to it?"

"Just me.

Last night, after the children were in bed."

"And?"

I had sat at this same table at midnight with my phone pressed to my ear and Mason's recorder playing beside it.

I had listened for two hours.

I had not slept after.

"There are recordings of Vanessa telling Lily she isn't a real member of this family.

Recordings of the pantry being locked.

Recordings of a woman named Deb in the house — her voice, Vanessa's voice, instructions to Mason to keep Lily in her room." I paused.

"There's one recording where Vanessa tells Lily that if she tells me anything, I'll send her to live with strangers because I never wanted her in the first place."

Patricia wrote something in her folder.

"She said that to a five-year-old," I said.

It wasn't a question.

I had heard it.

I just needed to say it out loud to someone else.

"Yes," Patricia said.

"She did."

"What does that mean for us legally?"

"It means we have a strong foundation." She set her pen down.

"I want to talk to both children separately, with your permission, before we go further.

I also want to photograph the bruise on your daughter's arm today, before it fades completely.

And I'd like the names of Lily's pediatrician and her school, if she's enrolled."

"She starts kindergarten in September."

"Has she had any medical appointments in the last six months?

Any that Vanessa took her to alone?"

I stopped.

I hadn't thought about that.

"I'd have to check."

"Check today." Patricia looked at me steadily.

"I'm not suggesting anything yet.

I'm making sure we have the complete picture."

I nodded.

"One more thing," she said.

"Vanessa mentioned last night that she knows something about you.

Something she believes would affect how a judge sees you.

Do you have any idea what she meant?"

"No."

"Think carefully.

Old financial trouble, a prior relationship, anything that could be framed negatively."

I thought.

"Nothing.

I've never been in legal trouble.

I've never been investigated for anything.

I pay my taxes.

I've been at the same company for eleven years."

"All right." She picked up her pen again.

"Then it's likely a pressure tactic.

People say that when they feel the ground shifting." She looked at me over the top of her folder.

"The ground is shifting, Mr.

Calloway.

In your favor.

But I want you prepared for the fact that she will push back before this is resolved.

Hard."

"How hard?"

Patricia's expression didn't change.

"She'll try to make this about your sl@pping her.

She'll say the children are coached.

She may claim the recorder was tampered with or that Mason was put up to it." She closed the folder.

"And she may bring Deb into it in a way you don't expect."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean we don't yet know who Deb is or what she knows.

And people who have something to hide sometimes decide that the best defense is to make the other side look worse." She stood up and buttoned her coat.

"I'd like to meet the children now, if that's all right."

I called them from the living room.

Lily came in first, holding the stack of drawings.

She set them on the table in front of Patricia without being asked.

Patricia looked down at them.

Then up at Lily.

"Did you make these?" she asked.

"Yes."

"They're very good." She pointed to the taller figure in the nearest drawing.

"Is that your dad?"

"Yes," Lily said.

"He always comes home.