Chapter 3
Security arrived before Linda could leave.
The strange doctor tried to say he had been called for a postpartum evaluation.
Carla demanded his badge.
He did not have one.
That was when the room changed.
Two guards restrained him.
Linda shouted for Michael.
I lay on the floor shaking, half under the bed, while Carla wrapped me in blankets and called my actual doctor.
Emily crawled beside me.
“I’m sorry,” she sobbed.
I pulled her close with the strength I had left.
“You saved us.”
“My brother?”
“He’s okay,” Carla said quickly. “He was never blue.”
Emily sniffed.
“I lied.”
Carla looked at her.
“Best lie I’ve heard all year.”
My real doctor, Dr. Patel, arrived with fury in her eyes.
“What happened?”
I told her everything.
The papers.
The sedative.
The plan to move my baby.
Linda interrupted.
“She is unstable. She just gave birth. She is imagining things.”
Dr. Patel looked at my chart.
“No sedative was ordered.”
The fake doctor’s bag was opened.
Inside were vials.
Blank consent forms.
A newborn transfer bracelet.
My name already printed.
My son’s name space left empty.
Linda stopped shouting.
That silence frightened me more than her rage.
Then Michael burst into the room.
My husband looked confused, breathless, terrified.
“Mom? Sarah? What is happening?”
Linda ran to him.
“She’s having an episode.”
Emily stood between me and Michael.
“No,” she cried. “Grandma tried to steal the baby.”
Michael stared at his mother.
For one second, he looked like a little boy begging the world not to be true.
Then he looked at me on the floor.
May you like
And at the strange man in cuffs.
His face went pale.
