Chapter 5 — He Studied the Baby’s Face

Instead, Nicolas studied the baby’s face, and I watched the happiness drain out of him by degrees, like water leaving a basin.

I did not understand, at first, what I was seeing.

I thought perhaps he was overcome, that the joy had tipped into that stunned quiet new fathers sometimes fall into.

It took me a few seconds to read his expression correctly, and when I did, my whole body went cold, because it was not wonder on his face.

It was suspicion.