“Then the heart will start beating harder and faster to try to get blood to the aorta and to the body. Most of it would be leaking out of the wound, of course, but it’s a beautiful thing, the way the entire body is structured to protect the heart and the way the heart would try to save itself, save its body. Once you know the anatomy, you appreciate it even more, don’t you?” Zachary seemed to come out of his reverie. “I would have loved med school. I would’ve done anything, worked any job, to get the money for tuition.”

Christine hoped she could get him back to her point. “What did you do, to get the money?”

“Everything, anything. I had three jobs. I was a movie usher, I was a math tutor, and I waited tables. I sold a futon on eBay. I sold my car, too. I even sold my plasma.”

“You can sell plasma?” Christine sensed they were getting closer.

“Sure, I sold blood, too. I even sold—” Zachary stopped himself, and Christine held her breath.

“You sold what?” she asked lightly, though her heart was thundering.

“I’d tell you, but you can’t put this in the book. This is off the record.” Zachary glanced over his shoulder, then leaned closer to the hole in the Plexiglas. “I sold sperm, too. They call it donating, but I don’t know why. They pay you.”

Christine felt her heart stop. She had rehearsed this moment last night, how she would react if he told her, yes or no. She was this close to finding out the answer, she could feel it within her grasp. She was dying to know, and she was terrified to know. She told herself to get her act together. She made herself continue. “You were a sperm donor? I always wondered how that worked.”

“I assume you know how it works.” Zachary chuckled. “Hey, it’s random, but I did it. It paid really well. They put you in a program, you do it for a year. I didn’t tell anybody. I thought it would help people, but I really needed the money. I knew my parents would kill me if they found out. My parents thought if people aren’t meant to get pregnant, they don’t get pregnant. They would think that was playing God.”

Christine felt herself reeling, as he spoke. Everything he was saying corroborated his online profile. She had to keep him going. “Zachary, how much did they pay you?”

“I made a thousand dollars that year, and I liked the people at the bank.”

“Bank?” Christine said, as if she were unfamiliar with the term.

“Sperm bank. It was called Homestead.”

“Oh?” Christine squeezed her golf pencil, masking her reaction, which was almost violent, her emotions in tumult.

“It had an office near campus. I donated anonymously. That’s the only way I’d make the deal. I gave them two pictures of me, because they kind of pressure you to do that. But they don’t release your name when they put it online. They give you a number.”

“A number?”

“Yes, a donor number.”

“What was your number?”

“Why?” Zachary frowned, surprised.

“I’m just curious.”

“My number was 3319.”

Chapter Twenty-four

Christine heard Zachary answer, confirming that he was Donor 3319, and she understood that he was her donor, their donor, the father of their baby, the biological father of their baby, yet she had a million thoughts flying through her head, setting her brain on fire, electrifying her senses, overloading her circuits.

She didn’t know what to say or do. She felt herself falling away from the world, the way she had the other day, having an out-of-body experience, observing herself hearing the news at the same time that she experienced hearing the news, and it was all she could do not to throw up, faint, start crying, or otherwise show her hand.

Her reaction felt like it lasted ten minutes, but it must’ve only been a moment or two because she noticed that Lauren was taking over the situation, leaning close to the Plexiglas, smiling at Zachary, and asking him a question, and then Zachary was smiling back and saying words that Christine was too freaked out to hear. Her heart hammered, she broke a new sweat in the sweltering booth, and her mouth went completely dry.

She had been right, all of her research and even her hunches had been right, and Zachary was Donor 3319, and now she didn’t know what to do. Because the father of her child was wanted for murder, even a string of serial killings, and she thought he might be innocent, but she also thought he might be guilty as sin.

The corrections officer walked over on the other side of the Plexiglas, and she realized that it was time to go, time to leave Zachary, even to say good-bye. She wanted to get her act together, to be wholly present, but she felt such a powerful conflict of emotions, like two gargantuan waves crashing into each other, because she had just found out that he was her donor at the same time that she would have to let him go, forever.

She could see Zachary turn to the guard behind him, and the guard bringing the handcuffs forward, and Lauren continuing the conversation, and Zachary talking back to her, the two of them smiling, and Christine struggled to come around, tuning in the sound of their talking, but she couldn’t fake joining them, stricken. The handcuffs made a jangling sound as the corrections officer carried them over, and Christine watched as Zachary offered his wrists, and the handcuffs snapped mechanically into place, ca-chink, and somehow that sound brought her to her senses and she realized that if she didn’t get it together, she wouldn’t get to say good-bye.

“Zachary?” Christine rose.

“Bye, Christine.” Zachary smiled. “Please, can you please lend me that money for the lawyer? When my trial’s over, we can get the book done, and I’ll pay you back out of the royalties, I swear. Please?”

Lauren interjected, “She’ll look into that, and we’ll get back to Griff. Hang in there. Best of luck. Bye!” Lauren stood beside Christine, turning to her and flaring her eyes meaningfully. “Say good-bye, Christine.”

“Good-bye, Zachary,” Christine said, on cue, her heart in her throat.

“Please!” Zachary called back, as the corrections officer took him by the elbow and escorted him out of the booth, locking the door behind them.

Lauren grabbed her arm and escorted her from the booth, almost the same way that the guard had escorted Zachary on the other side, and neither woman said a word because the other corrections officer was sitting on his chair and the visiting room was already beginning to fill up, with families seeing inmates.