CHAPTER 14 — THE BABY WITHOUT A NAME
The private maternity facility looked abandoned from the outside.
Inside, it was fully staffed.
Nathan immediately understood that Margaret had prepared it in advance.
The delivery room was warm, spotless, and already stocked for a premature birth.
Claire lay beneath white lights while June and two nurses worked around her.
Nathan refused to leave her side.
Margaret watched from behind a glass partition.
Claire’s contractions came too quickly.
“I can’t do this,” she whispered.
Nathan held her hand.
“Yes, you can.”
“They’re going to take the baby.”
“No one is taking our child.”
“You promised before.”
The words struck him.
He lowered his head.
“You’re right.”
Claire looked at him through tears.
Nathan continued:
“I failed you before. I will spend the rest of my life proving I won’t do it again.”
There was no time for forgiveness.
Only pain.
June checked the monitor.
“The baby’s heart rate is dropping.”
The attending physician prepared for an emergency procedure.
Nathan examined his badge.
Dr. Michael Reyes.
A name he had never seen on any Whitmore family record.
“You don’t work for Cole?” Nathan asked.
“No.”
“Who hired you?”
Reyes glanced toward Margaret.
“I was contacted three hours ago by a woman named Vanessa Whitmore.”
Nathan’s blood ran cold.
The real Vanessa had arranged the medical team.
But where was she?
Claire cried out again.
The room filled with urgent instructions.
Minutes blurred together.
Nathan kept his eyes on Claire.
Then a small sound cut through the chaos.
A weak cry.
Their baby had been born.
A girl.
Tiny.
Premature.
Alive.
Claire began sobbing.
Nathan touched his daughter’s hand as the medical team placed her inside the incubator.
“She’s breathing,” June said. “But she needs immediate neonatal care.”
Nathan looked at Claire.
“She’s here.”
Claire smiled through her exhaustion.
“What do we call her?”
Before he could answer, the power failed.
Emergency lights flashed red.
The incubator alarm began sounding.
Nathan turned toward the glass partition.
Margaret was gone.
“Lock the doors!” he shouted.
June activated the incubator’s backup oxygen.
A nurse ran toward the hall.
The delivery-room doors burst open.
Two security guards entered.
Nathan recognized neither man.
One grabbed him from behind.
The other pushed the incubator toward the corridor.
Claire tried to rise.
“No!”
Nathan drove his elbow backward and broke free.
He struck the first guard and ran after the incubator.
The second man locked the corridor door between them.
Nathan slammed both hands against the glass.
A woman stepped into view on the other side.
Vanessa.
She placed one hand on the incubator.
Nathan shouted her name.
She turned.
A scar was visible behind her left ear.
Veronica.
She smiled and pushed the incubator toward the service elevator.
Nathan seized a metal chair and drove it into the glass door.
The first strike cracked it.
The second widened the break.
By the time he forced himself through, the elevator doors had closed.
Nathan raced down the stairs.
On the ground floor, he reached the loading entrance just as a black vehicle sped away.
Gabriel arrived in another car.
“What happened?”
“She took the baby.”
“Veronica?”
“Yes.”
Gabriel held up the note from the blood ledger.
“Cole has separated from Margaret. Claire knew.”
“Why didn’t she tell me?”
“She may not have had time.”
Nathan looked back toward the facility.
Margaret stood at the entrance.
Two police officers had arrived, but they seemed uncertain whether to detain her.
Nathan walked toward her.
“You knew Veronica would come.”
“I knew she might.”
“You used my child to draw her out.”
“I gave Claire the only facility capable of saving your daughter.”
“And left a service entrance unguarded.”
Margaret’s face remained unreadable.
“Veronica had help.”
“Cole?”
“Possibly.”
“Where is Vanessa?”
Margaret looked at him.
“I don’t know.”
“You always know.”
“Not anymore.”
Nathan grabbed her arm.
“Tell me where Veronica would take the baby.”
Margaret looked toward Gabriel.
“To the only person she believes can give the child a new identity.”
Gabriel’s expression changed.
“Cole.”
Margaret nodded.
Nathan released her and turned toward the car.
A nurse ran from the building.
“Mr. Whitmore!”
Nathan stopped.
The nurse held Claire’s medical file.
“There’s something wrong with the birth record.”
“What?”
“The system registered two live births tonight.”
Nathan stared at her.
“Claire delivered one child.”
“I know.”
The nurse showed him the screen.
The first infant was listed as BABY GIRL WHITMORE.
The second was listed under another mother.
May you like
VANESSA WHITMORE.
The birth time was three minutes earlier.
