Chapter 7 - The Pregnancy
Claire almost dropped the phone.
“I’m the mother.”
Marianne answered gently.
“Yes.”
Claire looked at Evelyn.
Nobody understood.
Marianne clarified.
She wasn’t claiming Claire hadn’t conceived or carried the baby.
She was questioning the genetic record Northstar had generated.
Claire had undergone fertility treatment after two miscarriages.
Nothing unusual.
Medication.
Monitoring.
One intrauterine procedure.
No IVF.
At least that was what Claire believed.
Then Marianne asked:
“Did Dr. Vale ever sedate you?”
Claire remembered.
A procedure six months before this pregnancy.
Dr. Vale said a uterine polyp needed removal.
She was unconscious.
She woke with cramps.
Three weeks later, she discovered she was pregnant.
The clinic called it unexpected natural conception.
Claire covered her mouth.
“What did they do?”
Marianne didn’t know exactly.
But Thomas had discovered conflicting records.
One showed natural conception.
Another referenced an embryo transfer.
Claire’s name.
Ryan’s genetic code.
And an unidentified egg source.
Claire began shaking.
“If that’s true…”
Biologically, she might not be the child’s genetic mother.
But she was carrying him.
Protecting him.
Feeling every movement.
Whatever Northstar had done could not erase that relationship.
Ryan sank into a chair.
“They used us.”
Claire looked at him.
“Yes.”
Then at her ankle.
“And you used that as an excuse to use me.”
Ryan’s eyes filled.
He had no answer.
Marianne said Thomas was alive.
The gunshot had struck a wall during an attack on his safe house.
She had gotten him out.
Claire demanded proof.
A video call came thirty seconds later.
Thomas appeared.
Older.
Gray beard.
Blood on his sleeve but standing.
Claire sobbed.
Then punched the screen off.
She couldn’t handle seeing him yet.
Not after six years of mourning.
Melissa asked Marianne the obvious question.
“Who is the egg donor?”
Silence.
“Marianne?”
“I believe I know.”
Claire’s stomach tightened.
“Who?”
“Evelyn’s first daughter.”
Evelyn staggered backward.
“My baby died.”
Marianne replied:
“No.”
The room became silent.
Evelyn’s daughter had survived.
Arthur lied.
He took the infant into another Northstar family because she possessed a rare genetic profile.
Evelyn whispered:
“Where is she?”
“Alive.”
“Who is she?”
Marianne hesitated.
“Her name is Sarah.”
Evelyn cried.
“Where?”
Marianne answered:
“You know her.”
Claire felt dread.
Then Marianne said:
“She’s Claire’s obstetric nurse.”
Claire remembered Sarah Bell.
Forty.
Warm smile.
Always present during appointments.
The woman who touched Claire’s shoulder during ultrasounds.
The woman who repeatedly said:
“This baby is very special.”
Evelyn whispered:
“She’s my daughter?”
“Yes.”
“And her genetic material—”
“May have been used without her consent.”
Another victim.
Then Claire remembered something.
Sarah had disappeared from the clinic two weeks earlier.
No explanation.
Claire whispered:
“Where is she now?”
Marianne answered:
“That’s what Thomas and I were trying to find.”
Then someone knocked on the front door.
Three slow knocks.
Melissa looked through the window.
Her face changed.
“Claire.”
“What?”
“It’s Sarah.”
Claire stood.
Sarah Bell was outside.
Barefoot.
May you like
Terrified.
Holding a newborn baby.
