He was married to a well-known philanthropist, a woman who chaired galas and sat on boards, and together they had two teenage sons who attended elite private academies out on the coast.

He was, at that very moment, the leading candidate for the open State Senate seat in our district, the presumptive winner, a man whose face and name and carefully polished reputation were inescapable in the place where I lived.

And my daughter, my eighteen-year-old daughter, was telling me from beyond her grave that this man, this untouchable titan, was the father of my grandson.

For a moment I simply could not hold the two things in my mind at once, the vast public figure on the billboards and the frightened girl who had written this letter, the mansion and the delivery room, his empire and her grave.