���I do want to know about Belle. But I need to know the people she cared about, if I’m going to be able to understand where she might have gone.���
���Hayley, you don’t think she would have gone to stay with one of the other kids, do you?��� Nick asked as if the thought had just occurred to him.
Hayley shook her head. ���Uh-uh. Someone would have said.���
���So we have you, Belle, Ava and Ali-who are the others?��� Emme tapped her pencil on the tabletop.
���There’s Henry-he’s twenty-two and he lives in Connecticut. He just graduated from college. Lori is his sister-they’re from the same donor and the same mother so they’re, like, full siblings. She’s twenty and goes to Yale. Jessie-she’s nineteen-she used to live in Florida but last year her dad moved them to France. She used to be on the board a lot, but now, not so much.��� She thought that over for a moment before amending, ���Not ever anymore. Wayne and Will, they live in North Carolina. They’re seventeen and they’re twins. No one’s met them except for Belle.���
���When did Belle meet them?��� Nick asked.
���She drove down to meet them one time last year. She said they’re both really sweet guys but their mom doesn’t want any part of the donor-sib thing, so they don’t get to come to any of the get-togethers.���
���Why would Belle drive all the way down there just to meet them?��� Emme wondered aloud.
���Because they never got to meet anyone and they were both feeling left out, I guess.��� Hayley shrugged. ���Belle didn’t make a big deal out of it, she just went. The rest of us probably wouldn’t have even known if the guys hadn’t posted a picture of the three of them on the board. That was Belle, though. She’d do something nice but never talk about it.���
���So that makes nine, if I counted correctly,��� Nick said.
���There’s Justin, he’s twenty-one and lives in Virginia. He’s in college so we don’t hear from him very often.���
���Where does he go to school?��� Emme looked up from her notes.
���I don’t know. He transferred someplace but didn’t say where. He’s pretty much dropped out.���
She rested an elbow on the table and planted her chin in the palm of one hand and looked wistful. ���That happens sometimes. People drop out, they drop in, they drop out again, depending on what’s going on in their lives. They get busy.���
She smiled ruefully and added, ���Sometimes they get grounded. That’s sort of what we thought about Belle, that something was going on and she didn’t have time for us for a while. We-me and Ava and Ali-figured she’d be back when it suited her.���
���So it’s really not unusual to not hear from someone on the list for a while.��� Nick said. ���But you wouldn’t have thought it odd that someone dropped out for several months?���
���No.��� Hayley shook her head. ���Sometimes you just get overwhelmed with work. Plus, Belle said she was getting really busy with sorority rush coming up. We all thought she’d be back at the end of the school year.���
���Have you met, face-to-face, with everyone on the board?���
���No. Just Ali, Ava, Henry, Lori, and Belle. We’ve gotten together a few times. Well, Ava only once, ���cause she’s in grad school and is real busy.���
���How about last January?��� Nick asked.
Hayley turned to Emme. ���That’s the day you said she had on her calendar? The day she disappeared?���
���Yes. Did you get together that day?���
���We met in Philadelphia, me, Ali-she was in the area to visit Bryn Mawr-Belle, Henry, and Lori. I told my parents I had to go to the Philadelphia Art Museum for a school project, and that’s where we all met. We went through the museum together and then we had lunch there. It was so much fun.��� Hayley rested her elbow on the scarred tabletop, her fingers absently tracing a heart that someone had carved long ago, the inscription AS & MR still visible. Emme noticed the entire top of the table was one mass of carvings, as if people had been leaving their mark for generations.
���Did anything unusual happen?��� Nick asked.
Emme kicked him under the table. My job.
He sat back against the seat. I got the message. She’s all yours.
���I can’t think of anything,��� Hayley told him.
Emme sat back to permit the waitress to serve their pancakes. The aroma reminded her that she hadn’t eaten since six thirty that morning. By the way Nick was eyeing his plate, she suspected that he’d had an early breakfast as well.
���Anyone following you? Or maybe paying too much attention to your group, or to Belle?��� Emme waited for Hayley to finish with the syrup.
���No.��� Hayley shook her head, then a moment later, her eyes widened slightly. ���Oh. Well, there was this guy in the restaurant when we went downstairs to have lunch who was kind of flirting with her.���
���What did he look like?���
���Tall, kind of thin. Real, real light blond hair.��� Hayley shrugged. ���I didn’t pay much attention to him. I just remember that much because she sat across the table from me, and Henry said something like, ���Hey, Belle, your boyfriend’s back,��� and I turned around and saw him sit down at a table behind us.���
���What did he mean, he’s back? Had he been hanging around her, following her?���
���I don’t know. I hadn’t noticed if he did.��� She bit her bottom lip. ���I guess I should have been more observant. I should have noticed-���
���No, no,��� Emme assured her. ���It’s probably nothing. But just for the record, after lunch, where did you go? Did you go back to the exhibits?���
���Lori, Henry, and I went upstairs to the second floor, because he wanted to see the arms and armor display. He’s all into that Knights of the Round Table thing. Ali and Belle wanted to look at the photography exhibit on the ground floor. We all met up later outside, on the front steps. Then everyone sort of went their own way.���
���How did everyone travel that day, do you know?��� Emme continued to make notes.
���Lori, Henry, and I all came in by train, so we shared a cab back to Thirtieth Street Station. My train was already there, so I left as soon as we got there. Ali and Belle both had cars.���
���Do you know where Ali and Belle parked?���
���Ali got to park in the museum parking lot because she was early, but Belle was parked on some street somewhere.��� Hayley nodded. ���I remember that because Ali said she’d drive Belle to her car but Belle said it was okay, she’d walk, ���cause it was such a nice day.���
���Have you heard from Belle since the day at the museum, Hayley?���
Hayley stared into space, as if trying to recall.
���Maybe��� but I’m not really sure. Maybe I did��� but maybe not. I don’t know when I last heard from her. I didn’t really pay attention.��� She shook her head. ���I��� I don’t remember. But you said that was the day she disappeared, right?���
Emme nodded.
���So whatever happened to her, it must have happened to her there, right?��� Horrified, Hayley looked up at Emme. ���Something bad happened to her right there, that day, and none of us even knew.���
���There’s no way you could have known.��� Emme put her arm around Hayley in an attempt to comfort her. ���And there’s no way to prove that whatever happened, happened there and then. Something could have happened on her way back to school, or once she got there.���
���Or someone could have kidnapped her after she left us!��� she sobbed softly.
���Hayley, I’d like to have the email addresses and phone numbers of the other donor siblings,��� Emme told her, while making a mental note to find out if the art museum has surveillance cameras in the restaurant. ���Can you give me those? I think it’s time we spoke directly with them.���
���They might not like it.���
Tough.
Aloud, Emme said, ���I think they’d like it far less if they knew that something really bad could have happened to Belle, and that any one of them might know something that could lead us to her.���
���All right.��� Hayley found a tissue in her bag and wiped her face. ���I have the list at home. I can email it to you.���
���That would be great. Can you do it tonight?���
Clearly reluctant, Hayley nodded, and Emme suspected she might be worried what the others were going to say when they found out she was the one who gave out their information.
���Hayley, did Belle get along with all of the others?��� Emme asked, an attempt to find out if all was well among the siblings.
Hayley nodded. ���Everyone liked Belle. She’s the best.���
���We spoke with Dr. Drake at the fertility clinic,��� Nick told her. ���She mentioned that Belle had been there, hoping to find some information on Donor 1735. She said Belle had described herself as the spokesperson for the group.���
���When we started talking about maybe trying to find a way to figure out who Donor 1735 is-maybe even meet him-Belle volunteered to go to the clinic and see if they’d let her look at her mother’s file.��� Hayley smiled weakly. ���Which we all figured they wouldn’t let her do, but she wanted to give it a shot.���
���There was interest in finding Donor 1735?��� Emme asked.
���Sure. There’s a kid, Aaron? He actually did it, and he started out with only the little bit of description the clinic gave his mother, and the donor number,��� Hayley replied. ���There was a whole magazine article about him. It was pretty cool.���
���How complete was the description?��� Emme asked.
���I don’t know, but my mom said they told her that our donor was tall, blond, of Slovak and Irish background, athletic build, and that he was born in Philly Just that kind of stuff.���
���Someone was able to trace a donor with nothing more than that type of information?��� Nick appeared impressed. ���This Aaron must be one determined kid. How did he do it?���
Hayley shrugged. ���I don’t know. He did almost all of it on the Internet, but we all talked about how cool it would be if we could find 1735. Have a big reunion, you know?��� She played with a strand of her hair. ���Of course, it wouldn’t really be a reunion, you know, ���cause we’d never met him before.���
���Hayley, do you remember when this discussion took place?��� Emme asked.
The girl thought for a moment. ���I’m pretty sure it was sometime last year.��� She paused as if trying to remember. ���Yeah, it would have been. Because Jessie said she was going to do what Aaron did, but then her dad got transferred, like I said, and she pretty much forgot about it, I guess. Then it all came up again in the fall, and we were all still talking about it when we got together.���
���You talked about this when you were at the museum?��� Emme asked.
���Yeah. Someone said how cool it was that we were in Philly and that he had been born in Philly, you know, back then. And how maybe he could even have been there, at the museum, right then. And then someone else said that maybe he’d been going out when we were coming in and we’d walked right past him and didn’t know him and he didn’t know us. Stuff like that.���
���Was anyone in your group thinking about tracking down Donor 1735, besides Jessie?��� Nick’s fingers closed around his coffee cup.
���Belle was. She’d already gotten in touch with this kid, Aaron, the one who found his donor? She said he told her what he did, and how he did it, and she was pretty sure she could do it, so we were all pretty psyched about that.���
���Do you know how far she got? Was she able to identify him?��� Emme asked.
���I don’t know, but I kinda think she might have been getting close.��� Hayley sucked the rest of her drink through her straw in a loud whoosh. ���When we asked her about it, she just smiled and said ���Stay tuned.������
���Stay tuned.��� Nick repeated flatly.
���Yeah.���
���Hayley, was Belle particularly close to any one of your siblings? Someone she might have confided in?���
���Ali, maybe. But she was pretty friendly with all of us.���
���So everyone knew she was looking for Donor 1735.���
Hayley nodded. ���Sure. It wasn’t a secret. And Belle was scary smart. If she said she’d find him, we all knew it was only a matter of time until she did.���
TWELVE
Well, so much for Belle’s father not being a factor in her life,��� Nick said after they’d exchanged email addresses with Hayley and headed back to Emme’s car. ���Wendy got that wrong.���
���Maybe Belle never showed any interest in her father while your sister was still alive. Maybe losing her mother when she did made her curious about her other parent. Once she realized she had all these half-siblings, her curiosity might have been fueled by theirs.��� Emme had to stretch to keep up with Nick’s long stride. ���Did she ever say anything at all to you about her father, or wanting to know more about him?���
���Never.��� He shook his head. ���Belinda never gave any hint that she knew how she was conceived or that she’d found she had half-siblings. I’ve been looking back over conversations we’ve had these past few years, thinking maybe she’d tossed out a sign or two and I just missed it. But I can’t recall that she’d even hinted at any of this.���
���I wonder how long she knew, how old she was when Wendy told her.���
���I have no idea. I’m still trying to figure out why Wendy never mentioned it to me. She never mentioned wanting to be a single mother. I had no idea why she made that decision, or when.��� He appeared thoughtful. ���Or why Belinda never said anything. Wendy I can maybe understand. She was so much older than I was, maybe she thought I was too young to have that conversation with. But Belinda��� well, I guess I thought we were closer than that.���
���Maybe she assumed you knew and that you didn’t want to discuss it. Maybe she thought her mother had told you and that you’d disapproved.���
���Maybe.���
���I wonder how far Belinda got in her search for her donor.���
���I was wondering that myself.��� They reached the corner of Witherspoon Street and turned right.
���Suppose, just suppose, Belle had been able to figure out who Donor 1735 was. Suppose she even tried to contact him. How happy would this guy be to hear from a kid he didn’t know existed, who maybe wants to call him Daddy? Oh, and to find out he had ten other kids who want to call him Daddy, too.��� Emme dug in her pocket for her car keys.
���Probably not so much. There might be some guys who’d take it in stride but they’d be in the minority.��� He thought for a moment. ���Yeah, mostly I don’t think these guys would be too happy. They were promised anonymity; they don’t expect that to ever be violated.���
���And let’s face it, this would be a huge invasion of their privacy.���
���Do you think that would stop a bunch of kids from trying?���
���No. Nick, if Belle had gotten that close to finding him, would she have told the others?���
���
I don’t know. Belinda-I have a hard time calling her Belle. It’s tough to keep a name straight like that when you’ve always known someone by another name.���
Tell me about it.
They arrived at her car, and she unlocked both doors with the remote. She started the engine and pulled away from the curb, her mind racing.
���Okay, how about this?��� Emme was thinking aloud, playing with different scenarios. ���Suppose she had figured it out. Would she have contacted the guy her research led her to and asked him if he’d been a donor, before she told the others she’d found him?���
���You mean, instead of telling them first?��� Nick thought it over. ���Yeah, I could see her doing that. Rather than get everyone tuned up that she’d found him, she might go that one extra step and make sure.���
���Are you sure there were no notes about this in any of those boxes you went through?���
���No, I’m not sure. I didn’t really know what I was looking for. Maybe you should take a look.���
���I’m going to do that.��� She drove thoughtfully for a few minutes, watching for the signs for I-95. ���Damn, I wish we had her computer. You know it was all in there.���
���You’re probably right.���
���No probably. You heard Hayley. This kid, Aaron, found his donor by using the Internet. If Belinda had contacted him, and followed his lead, she’d have done the same.���
���I wish we knew for sure what happened to her laptop.���
���I think we do know what happened. I think whoever is responsible for her disappearance has it.���
Emme signaled to turn onto the interstate and noted that rush hour traffic was in full swing.
���So where do we go from here?��� Nick asked.
���We contact each one of the kids on that board, and we ask them to talk to us. I want to get a feel for the rest of the kids involved in this, get a better idea of how they all felt about Belle, how they felt about searching for their donor. Some of them might not have been as cozy with the idea as Hayley thinks they were.���
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