At 1:09 p.m., Jonah Mercer had two registers open in front of him, and neither was supposed to decide who a child belonged to.
The first was the official register for the temporary courtroom: names, representatives, arrival times, reporting restrictions. The second was not quite a register yet. A gray Lhomond Center folder, placed on the table to his right, contained three sealed first accounts, three anonymized identifiers, and an instruction in capitals: **DO NOT COMPARE IN FRONT OF THOSE GIVING ACCOUNTS. DO NOT ARRANGE CONTACT.**
Between them, a phone kept vibrating against the wood. With each vibration, the official register trembled slightly while the gray folder stayed still. Jonah wished he had not noticed which document seemed more solid.
“Turning it over again,” Priya said, “won’t make it any less urgent.”
Jonah looked at her.
“I’m looking for a third side.”
They had moved the hearing to a conference room in the annex because the main court office’s phone lines were overwhelmed and about forty people were already waiting on the sidewalk, some carrying felt-tip signs: **OUR CHILDREN EXIST**; **MEMORY IS KINSHIP**; **PROTECT THE FAMILIES HERE**. No one had yet decided whether those slogans belonged to two sides or twenty.
The court clerk came in with a binder under her arm.
“The judge will be here in four minutes. The Haleems are still at their accommodation. The police recommend leaving before two.”
“Why before two?” Jonah asked.
“A TV channel named their street.”
Priya closed her eyes.
“The house number?”
“Not yet.”
“Then we still have an address to protect.”
The clerk nodded.
End of excerpt. Discover the other stories in this universe.