Chapter 8
The world stopped.
A doctor.
The man who was supposed to deliver my daughter.
Paid to kill her.
I pressed my hands to my stomach. The baby kicked. Strong. Alive.
“Have him arrested,” my father said, his voice shaking with rage. “Now.”
Marcus shook his head.
“We can’t,” he said. “We have the emails. But they’re encrypted. We can’t prove they’re real. Not yet. If we arrest him now, he’ll deny everything. Helen will disappear again. We’ll never get the proof we need.”
He looked at me.
“We have to let him think he’s getting away with it. Let Helen think her plan is working. Then, when they make their move, we catch them red-handed.”
I thought about it.
It was dangerous.
Terrifying.
But it was the only way to end this.
Once and for all.
“Okay,” I said. “We do it your way.”
The next two weeks were the longest of my life.
I switched hospitals. Secretly.
Only my father, Marcus, and my new doctor knew.
We told everyone I was still going to the original hospital. Still using the paid-off doctor.
Marcus’s men watched the doctor twenty-four hours a day.
Watched Helen.
She moved back to the city. Renting a small apartment near the hospital.
Waiting.
I was eight months pregnant now.
Big. Tired. My back ached all the time.
Noah was my rock.
He’d rub my back. Sing to the baby. Tell me stories.
“Only a few more weeks,” he’d say. “Then the baby comes. And we’re a family.”
I held him tight.
“Yes,” I said. “A family.”
Then the pains started.
Two weeks early.
It was two in the morning.
I woke up screaming. A sharp, tearing pain in my stomach.
Noah came running into my room. His face scared.
“Nice Lady?” he said.
I forced a smile.
“Go get Marcus,” I said. “Tell him it’s time.”
Marcus called the ambulance.
We went to the original hospital.
The one Helen thought I was using.
The paid-off doctor was waiting for me.
His smile was too wide. Too cold.
“Right on time, Ms. Ward,” he said. “Let’s get you to the delivery room.”
Marcus squeezed my hand once as they wheeled me away.
A silent promise.
We’re watching.
The delivery room was cold.
The doctor and two nurses bustled around me.
I was hooked up to monitors. Beeping. Steady.
The pains got worse.
Harder.
“Push,” the doctor said. “Push hard.”
I pushed.
Screamed.
Then I saw it.
The doctor slipped his hand into his pocket. Pulled out a small syringe. Clear liquid inside.
He turned away from me. Toward the baby’s side of the table.
My heart stopped.
This was it.
Then the door burst open.
Marcus. Three police officers.
“Freeze!” Marcus shouted.
The doctor dropped the syringe.
It shattered on the floor.
The nurses screamed.
The police cuffed the doctor. Led him away.
My real doctor ran in.
“Let’s get this baby out,” she said, calm as anything.
Ten minutes later.
A cry.
Loud. Strong.
My daughter.
They put her on my chest.
Warm. Soft. Perfect.
I cried.
She had my eyes. My father’s nose.
“Lily,” I whispered. “Her name is Lily.”
Marcus came in a few minutes later.
He held up a pair of handcuffs.
“We got her,” he said. “Helen was in the parking garage. Waiting for the doctor to call her and say it was done. She didn’t even fight.”
I held Lily tighter.
It was over.
Finally.
The next few days were a blur.
Visitors. Flowers. Cards.
Noah was the first to hold Lily.
He sat on the edge of my bed. So careful.
“Hi, Lily,” he said. “I’m your big brother. I love you.”
My father cried when he held her.
“Thank you,” he said to me. “For giving me a second chance. For giving me this.”
Helen’s trial started a month later.
She was charged with attempted murder, conspiracy, kidnapping, perjury, fraud, and a dozen other crimes.
The evidence was overwhelming.
The emails. The doctor’s testimony. The syringe. The security tapes.
Helen’s lawyer tried to paint her as a victim. A poor single mother driven mad by a rich, powerful woman who’d taken everything from her.
No one believed him.
The jury was out for two days.
Guilty on all counts.
The judge sentenced her to thirty years in prison.
No parole.
As the guards led her away, Helen looked at me.
No anger. No malice.
Just nothing.
Empty.
I felt no joy.
No victory.
Just sadness.
For her. For Noah. For the life she could have had if she’d chosen love instead of hate.
I walked out of the courthouse.
The sun was shining.
Marcus was waiting for me.
He held the car door open.
“Ready to go home?” he asked.
I smiled.
Home.
The penthouse wasn’t just a penthouse anymore.
It was where Noah waited for us. Where Lily slept in her crib. Where my father had his own room down the hall.
It was home.
I got in the car.
As we drove away, my phone buzzed.
A text from Liam.
The Langford board just voted. You’re officially the permanent CEO. Congratulations.
I smiled. Put the phone away.
I looked out the window.
At the city I’d fought so hard for.
At the life I’d built.
From a girl tied to a chair in a garage.
To a CEO. A mother. A daughter. A sister.
I’d won.
But the best part?
The war was over.
I could finally rest.
Then Marcus’s phone rang.
He answered. Listened.
His face went pale.
He hung up.
“What is it?” I asked.
May you like
He turned to me.
“Daniel,” he said. “He escaped from prison. Last night. No one knows where he is.”
