Chapter 4 - What the File Was Never Meant to Reveal
I called in sick the next morning for the first time in four years.
I didn't go anywhere near the agency. I drove to the Millbrook Public Library and spent three hours on their computers pulling every public record I could get my hands on. Court filings. Child protective services hearing notices. Local news archives going back fifteen years.
Paula Rourke's name came up twice.
The first was a commendation. Fifteen years ago the county had recognized her for reducing the number of kids cycling through the foster system. There was a photo of her holding a small plaque, smiling into the camera.
The second was a single paragraph buried in an eight-year-old community newsletter. A family named Deramus had "quietly relocated out of state following an unspecified investigation." No charges filed. No other details.
I sat back in the library chair.
No charges filed.
I drove home and called a woman I'd known since college — Dana Whitlock, who'd spent twenty years as a family law attorney before moving to a nonprofit that handled child welfare cases. We hadn't talked in over a year. She picked up on the second ring.
"I need advice," I said. "Off the record, for now."
"Go."
I told her everything Eli had said. I read her the names — Barlow, Selby, Deramus. I told her about Rourke showing up at the police station before Eli had even finished giving his statement. I told her about the file that was supposed to contain false-report documentation I had never seen.
She was quiet for a moment. "You said you read his file before the adoption."
"Every page."
"And there was no record of prior false reports."
"Nothing. Placement disruptions, early behavioral notes — withdrawn, wouldn't talk. Nothing about accusations. Nothing about misconduct."
"Then one of two things is true," Dana said. "Either those records were never created — which means Rourke ran it verbally, off the books, threatening him with documentation she never actually filed. Or they existed and got pulled before the file reached you."
"Which one is worse?"
"The first. Because it means she had total control over what those kids believed about themselves, and there's no trail to follow."
I pressed my hand flat against the counter. "Dana. There's a stepdaughter. Third family. I don't know her name and I don't know where she is."
"How old would she be now?"
"Ten or eleven when Eli was fifteen. So nineteen, twenty."
"Old enough to speak for herself. If she's willing." A pause. "You don't find her directly. But I might know someone who can. Give me a day."
I thanked her and hung up. I was standing in the hallway when Eli came in from school. He stopped the second he saw my face.
"What'd you find?"
"Not enough yet," I said. "But I'm not stopping."
He nodded once. He started for his room, then turned back.
"The Deramus stepdaughter," he said. "Her name was Nora. I only heard it once. But I never forgot it."
I went upstairs and wrote it on a piece of paper next to my phone. Nora Deramus.
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That night my phone buzzed with a number I didn't recognize. No hello. Just seven words.
I heard you're asking about the Rourke cases.
