Kenneth opened the folder. Connor tried to smile again, but the expression had lost its architecture. “What is this?”

Kenneth didn’t answer him. He looked at me, and in that look I understood that the thing we’d suspected had become something heavier. Not a possibility.

Not a theory. A document.

The first page carried a certified chain-of-custody seal. The second had Connor’s full legal name. The third had the name of the fertility clinic we’d used for the last three years of our marriage.

My lungs went tight. My hands stayed still.

The baby bottle slipped out of Melinda’s fingers and struck the tile with a sharp plastic crack. Formula spread across the floor in a pale crescent, reaching toward Connor’s polished shoe.