Chapter 4

He didn't say yes, because my mother arrived.

"Lyndon Prescott, are you even human!"

She rushed into the corridor and slapped him hard across the face. Then she saw me sitting on the floor, covered in blood, and the tears came all at once.

"Hilary, where's the baby? Where's my granddaughter?"

I opened my mouth, and not a single word came out. Beside me, a nurse lowered her head, eyes red.

Something seemed to break in my mother. Her body swayed.

"She's gone?"

I finally sobbed out loud.

"Mom, I'm sorry. I couldn't save her."

She held me tight and shook with weeping.

"What did you do wrong? The baby was only thirty-five weeks! He was the one who insisted on cutting her out!"

She spun around, grabbed the birthday photo off the table, and hurled it at Lyndon.

In the photo, Hilda held my daughter, and pinned to the swaddling blanket was that card—the birthday gift for Hilda.

Seeing it, my mother lost herself completely.

"My daughter nearly died bringing that baby into the world, and you took her to celebrate some other woman's birthday? Now the baby's dead. Are you satisfied?!"

Hilda spoke up, her eyes reddened.

"Ma'am, I never thought anything would happen to the baby!"

"You shut your mouth!"

My mother reached over and flipped what was left of the birthday cake off the table by her bed.

"You want to be a mother, then go have your own! What gives you the right to steal my daughter's child!"

Hilda flinched back, her face going white in an instant.

Lyndon moved at once to shield her.

"Mom, Hilda has late-stage cancer. She can't take this kind of shock!"

My mother's chest heaved with fury.

"Don't call me Mom. You don't deserve to. My granddaughter just died, your wife's belly is still bleeding, and you're worried about upsetting a slut?"

"Lyndon, when I gave Hilary to you, you knelt in front of me and swore you'd cherish her for the rest of her life! Is this how you cherish her!"

A crowd had gathered in the corridor, and Lyndon's face grew uglier by the second.

Hilda suddenly clutched her chest, her breathing quick and shallow.

"Lyndon, I can't breathe, am I dying!"

Lyndon's expression changed in an instant. He caught Hilda up in his arms and barked at security,

"Get her out of here. No one comes in without my order. No one upsets Hilda!"

Two guards stepped forward and pulled at my mother.

"Don't touch me! My daughter is still here!"

My mother fought them with everything she had, and I bit down on the guards' hands as hard as I could, but even when I drew blood, they wouldn't let go!

In the chaos, my mother's foot found empty air, and the back of her head slammed against the stairs.

"Mom!"

In that instant, every agony played out before my eyes like a spinning lantern. I threw myself at her, but she was already still.

Blood seeped slowly from the back of her head and mingled with mine, and the world darkened, then darkened again.

I knelt on the floor, my hands shaking too hard to cover the wound.

"Doctor! Save my mother!"

A nurse rushed a crash cart over.

Lyndon had frozen too, but Hilda was crying in his arms that it hurt.

He hesitated only a few seconds, then turned with her still in his arms.

"Take Hilda to her room first!"

I watched his back, and suddenly I forgot even to cry.

Her again. Every single time, her.

They worked on my mother for two hours. When the doctor came out, he couldn't meet my eyes.

"Dr. Swanson, there was a massive intracranial hemorrhage. We did everything we could."

The death notice for my daughter slipped from my hand to the floor, and beside it now lay one for my mother.

In a single day, my daughter was gone, and my only mother was gone too.

When Lyndon hurried back, I was kneeling at my mother's bedside, smoothing her hair. His voice was hoarse.

"Hilary, what happened was just an accident."

I looked up at him and closed my eyes.

"Get out."

"I'll make it up to you. Anything you want."

"Get out!"

I grabbed everything by the bed and threw it at him, and a tearing pain ripped through my abdomen.

The next second, blood poured out from beneath me.

A nurse screamed and rushed in.

"Dr. Swanson is hemorrhaging again!"

As they wheeled me into the ER, Lyndon finally panicked. He chased the bed the whole way.

"Hilary, look at me!"

I closed my eyes and let the tears fall. My daughter was dead, my mother was dead, and there was no one left in this world waiting for me to come home.

Before consciousness slipped away completely, I heard the doctor's terrified shout.

"Blood pressure's dropping! Director Prescott, Dr. Swanson's heart has stopped!"