Mary Higgins Clark - As Time Goes By

Thank you for downloading this Simon & Schuster eBook.

Join our mailing list and get updates on new releases, deals, bonus content and other great books from Simon & Schuster.

C LICK H ERE T O S IGN U P

or visit us online to sign up at
eBookNews.SimonandSchuster.com

B Y M ARY H IGGINS C LARK

The Melody Lingers On

Death Wears a Beauty Mask

Ive Got You Under My Skin

Daddys Gone A Hunting

The Magical Christmas Horse (Illustrated by Wendell Minor)

Ill Walk Alone

The Shadow of Your Smile

Just Take My Heart

Where Are You Now?

Ghost Ship (Illustrated by Wendell Minor)

I Heard That Song Before

Two Little Girls in Blue

No Place Like Home

Nighttime Is My Time

The Second Time Around

Kitchen Privileges

Mount Vernon Love Story

Silent Night / All Through the Night

Daddys Little Girl

On the Street Where You Live

Before I Say Good-Bye

Well Meet Again

All Through the Night

You Belong to Me

Pretend You Dont See Her

My Gal Sunday

Moonlight Becomes You

Silent Night

Let Me Call You Sweetheart

The Lottery Winner

Remember Me

Ill Be Seeing You

All Around the Town

Loves Music, Loves to Dance

The Anastasia Syndrome and Other Stories

While My Pretty One Sleeps

Weep No More, My Lady

Stillwatch

A Cry in the Night

The Cradle Will Fall

A Stranger Is Watching

Where Are the Children?

B Y M ARY H IGGINS C LARK AND C AROL H IGGINS C LARK

Dashing Through the Snow

Santa Cruise

The Christmas Thief

He Sees You When Youre Sleeping

Deck the Halls

B Y M ARY H IGGINS C LARK AND A LAFAIR B URKE

All Dressed in White

The Cinderella Murder

Simon & Schuster

1230 Avenue of the Americas

New York, NY 10020

www.SimonandSchuster.com

This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the authors imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright 2016 by Nora Durkin Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Simon & Schuster Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition April 2016

SIMON & SCHUSTER and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact Simon & Schuster Special Sales at 1-866-506-1949 or

The Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau can bring authors to your live event. For more information or to book an event contact the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau at 1-866-248-3049 or visit our website at www.simonspeakers.com.

Interior design by Jill Putorti

Jacket design by Jackie Seow

Jacket photo-illustration by Shasti Oleary

Author photograph by Bernard Vidal for Simon & Schuster

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Clark, Mary Higgins, author.

Title: As time goes by / Mary Higgins Clark.

Description: New York : Simon & Schuster, 2016.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016007706 | ISBN 9781501130441 (hardback) |

ISBN 9781501131097 (mass market paperback)

Subjects: LCSH: Suspense fiction. | Legal stories. | BISAC: FICTION / Suspense. |

FICTION / Mystery & Detective / General. | FICTION / General. Classification:

LCC PS3553.L287 A87 2016 | DDC 813/.54dc23 LC record available at

http://lccn.loc.gov/2016007706

ISBN 978-1-5011-3044-1

ISBN 978-1-5011-3110-3 (ebook)

For the newlyweds, Dr. James and Courtney Clark Morrison, with love

T he first wail of the infant was so penetrating that the two couples outside the birthing room of midwife Cora Banks gasped in unison. James and Jennifer Wrights eyes lit up with joy. Relief and resignation formed the expression on the faces of Rose and Martin Ryan, whose seventeen-year-old daughter had just given birth.

The couples only knew each other as the Smiths and the Joneses. Neither one had any desire to know the true identity of the other. A full fifteen minutes later they were still waiting anxiously to see the newborn child.

It was a sleepy seven-pound girl with strands of curling black ringlets that contrasted with her fair complexion. When her eyes blinked open they were large and deep brown. As Jennifer Wright reached out to take her, the midwife smiled. I think we have a little business to complete, she suggested.

James Wright opened the small valise he was carrying. Sixty thousand dollars, he said. Count it.

The mother of the baby who had just been born had been described to them as a seventeen-year-old high school senior who had gotten pregnant the night of the senior prom. That fact had been hidden from everyone. Her parents told family and friends that she was too young to go away to college and would be working for her aunt in her dress shop in Milwaukee. The eighteen-year-old boy who was the father had gone on to college never knowing about the pregnancy.

Forty thousand dollars for the college education of the young mother, Cora announced as she counted the money and handed that amount to the young mothers parents, her thick arms still holding tightly to the baby. She did not add that the remaining twenty thousand dollars was for her service in delivering the baby.

The grandparents of the newborn accepted the money in silence. Jennifer Wright reached out her yearning arms and whispered, Im so happy.

Cora said, Ill have the birth registered in your names. Her smile was mirthless and did nothing to enhance her plain, round-cheeked face. Although she was only age forty, her expression made her seem at least ten years older.

She turned to the young mothers parents. Let her sleep for another few hours, then take her home.

In the birthing room the seventeen-year-old struggled to shake off the sedation that had been administered liberally. Her breasts felt as though they were swelling from the impact of holding her baby those first few moments after the birth. I want her, I want her, were the words screaming from her soul. Dont give my baby away. Ill find a way to take care of her....

Two hours later, curled up on the backseat of the family car, she was taken to a nearby motel.

The next morning she was alone on a plane on her way back to Milwaukee.

A nd now for the usual block of commercials, Delaney Wright whispered to her fellow anchor on the WRL 6 P.M. news. All of them so fascinating.

They pay our salaries, Don Brown reminded her with a smile.

I know they do, God bless them, Delaney said cheerfully, as she looked into the mirror to check her appearance.

She wasnt sure if the deep purple blouse the wardrobe mistress had picked out was too strong against her pale skin, but it was okay with her shoulder-length black hair. And Iris, her favorite makeup artist, had done a good job accentuating her dark brown eyes and long lashes.

The director began the countdown. Ten, nine... three, two... As he said, one, Delaney began to read. Tomorrow morning jury selection will begin in the trial of forty-three-year-old former high school teacher Betsy Grant at the Bergen County Courthouse in Hackensack, New Jersey. Grant is being tried for the murder of her wealthy husband Dr. Edward Grant, who was fifty-eight years old at the time of his death. He had been suffering from early onset Alzheimers disease. She has steadfastly declared her innocence. The prosecutor maintains that she was tired of waiting for him to die. She and his son are the co-heirs of his estate, which has been estimated at over fifteen million dollars.