“How much?”
“Usually five hundred dollars. Sometimes more.”
“From where?”
“My personal savings.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I knew how it would look.”
I struggled to keep my voice level.
“How would it look?”
“Like I was doing the same thing you were doing.”
The answer stopped me.
Maya swallowed.
“My mother contacted me when I was four months pregnant. She said she was ill. I didn’t believe her at first. Then she sent medical records.”
“What kind of illness?”
“Kidney disease.”
“Have you spoken to her doctor?”
“No.”
“Have you seen her?”
“No.”
“Maya.”
“I know.”
There was shame in her voice, but also something else—fear.
“She asked me not to tell anyone,” Maya said. “She said the people caring for her would stop helping if they thought I had a wealthy husband.”
“Who are the people caring for her?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’ve been sending money to people you don’t know?”
“To an account she gave me.”
“What is the name on the account?”
Maya looked at me.
“Hudson Family Consulting.”
I felt the blood drain from my face.
“That’s the same company my mother has been paying.”
Maya’s expression changed from guilt to confusion.
“What?”
“There are transfers from the family account. Nine hundred dollars at a time.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“Did you tell my mother?”
“No.”
“Did she know about your mother contacting you?”
“I don’t think so.”
I opened my phone and called Daniel.
He answered immediately.
“I was about to call you,” he said.
“What did you find?”
“Hudson Family Consulting is not a medical provider. It was registered sixteen months ago in Delaware. The listed manager is a man named Samuel Reeves.”
“I don’t know him.”
“Maybe not. But your mother does.”
“How?”
“Samuel Reeves was your father’s business partner.”
The hospital room seemed to tilt.
“My father didn’t have a business partner.”
“He did, according to the corporate records. They owned a small property company together before your father died.”
I remembered an office above a hardware store. The smell of dust and coffee. My father letting me stamp envelopes while he worked.
I had been twelve when he died.
My mother told us the business had failed.
“What does this have to do with Maya’s mother?” I asked.
“I don’t know yet,” Daniel said. “But there’s more. Hudson Family Consulting was created using an address connected to an old storage facility in Queens.”
