Chapter 4

The alarm kept shrieking.

The doctor shoved Morton aside and shouted at Craig:

"The fetus is in severe distress, and the patient could go into hemorrhagic shock!"

"If you keep obstructing treatment, you'll be held legally responsible!"

Craig spread his hands.

"I'm not obstructing anything."

"She's the one who won't sort out her own family dispute."

He pointed at my swollen belly.

"We're already divorced. Who knows if this kid is even mine?"

"Unless she hands over the house, why should I sign and take on the liability?"

When those words dropped, every doctor and nurse in the hallway froze.

I rode out a contraction and reached up to clutch the hem of his shirt.

"Craig."

"The baby is eight months along. You were at every prenatal checkup."

"Save her first. We can talk about the house later."

He flung my hand back at me.

"Weren't you so capable?"

"Weren't you brave enough to change the locks and throw me out?"

Craig leaned down over me.

"Now you know to beg me?"

"Dorothy, if you don't give the house to Morton today, you can rot in here with this little bastard."

I looked at that familiar face, and suddenly I remembered our wedding day.

He'd said that through poverty or sickness, he would stand in front of me.

And now he really was standing in front of me.

Blocking my only way to live.

Clara rushed into the ER holding up her phone, aiming the camera straight at me.

"Everyone, take a look. This is the woman."

"She's squatting on her husband's family's house and won't let her brother-in-law get married, and now she's getting what she deserves with a difficult labor."

The doctor threw up a hand to block the lens.

"No filming in here. Get out, now!"

Clara took two steps back and kept shouting:

"What's wrong with me recording the facts?"

"We're keeping evidence, so she can't blame us if she dies on the operating table."

Joyce nodded along, over and over.

She grabbed my hand again and pressed it toward the agreement.

"Don't blame Mom for being harsh, dear."

"You hand over the house, and Craig will save you, of course."

I curled my fingers in with everything I had.

Joyce brought her hand down on the back of mine.

"You're still guarding your money at a time like this?"

"Is a house worth more than your life?"

A buzzing filled my ears, and the figures in front of me started to blur into one another.

The baby inside me stirred, faintly, as if crying out to me for help.

I bit down on the tip of my tongue and forced myself to stay clear-headed.

Joyce had my right hand pinned, but my left crept toward the edge of the bed.

The nurse's phone was still lying there, the screen still lit.

Craig caught the movement and snatched the phone away.

"Who else are you trying to call?"

He powered it off, shoved it in his pocket, and set my ID down beside the agreement.

"Stop waiting. No one's coming to save you."

"Sign, press your thumbprint, and I'll sign the consent form right away."

Morton helped Joyce pry my fingers open.

"Mom, hurry!"

"Once the thumbprint's down, the house is ours."

Clara pushed her camera in closer.

"Get a clear shot, so she can't deny it when she wakes up."

My thumb drew closer and closer to the name on the agreement.

On the monitor, the fetal heart rate dropped to eighty-two.

The doctor spun around and shouted at the nurse:

"Get her to the OR now. I'll take responsibility!"

But Craig threw himself across the front of the bed.

"Anyone who touches her, I'll file a complaint!"

"Without a family member's signature, if someone dies, can your hospital afford to pay for it?"

The words had barely left his mouth when the closed door was kicked open.

A document stamped with a bright red seal smacked Craig across the face.