Chapter 2

The door didn't lock from the inside. That was the first thing I learned when I tried to turn the latch, my fingers still shaking, the clinic statement pressed against my chest like a shield. The maternity suite had a privacy bolt that only worked from the hallway side—a safety measure, the nurse had told me, so patients couldn't lock themselves in if something went wrong.

So Selene could come back.

I stood there for a long moment, my ear against the wood, listening for the click of her heels in the corridor. Nothing. The hallway was quiet, the kind of hush that falls over hospitals after midnight when even the machines seem to breathe slower. She was gone. For now.

I turned back to the room, cataloging the mess. Ceramic shards scattered across the pale-beige carpet, some still holding the faint sheen of the vase's glaze. The IV pole stood crooked beside the bed, the bag still swinging slightly from where my hips had crashed into it. My hospital bracelet was loose on my wrist, the white plastic irritating against my skin.

I walked to the visitors' chair and sat down heavily, my hand resting on the curve of my belly. The baby kicked again, softer this time, like she was settling down for the night. Or maybe she was just as exhausted as I was.

I looked at the paper in my hand for the hundredth time. Selene Cross. Three payments. A Manhattan fertility clinic I recognized from the gala circuit, the kind of place where celebrities went to have twins. I'd seen their billboards in the backs of magazines, their discreet ads in the programs at charity events.

I'd never been there.

But Selene had.

The dates told a story I hadn't expected. The first payment was three months ago, just before I'd announced my pregnancy at a small dinner party. I remembered the way Jonah's face had lit up, the way he'd held my hand under the table. I remembered the toast, the congratulations, the way I'd felt like I was finally becoming part of a world I'd only ever observed from the outside.

The second payment was two months ago. The third, one month.

Sporadic. Desperate. The kind of schedule you kept when you were running out of time.

I leaned back in the chair, staring at the ceiling. The pale-rose walls glowed softly in the lamplight, and I could see a fine crack running from the window frame to the corner, a hairline fracture I hadn't noticed when I'd checked in. I studied it like it held the answer to a question I was too afraid to ask.