Chapter 1 - The Woman Who Screamed First
Isabella Rossi’s heel struck Khloe Thorne just beneath the curve of her pregnant belly.
Khloe did not scream.
She heard Isabella scream for her.
The sound ripped through the private hospital suite before Khloe’s spine slammed against the marble table.
Pain exploded across her lower back.
Her hands instinctively closed around her stomach.
For one terrifying second, the baby inside her went completely still.
Isabella stepped backward.
The cruelty disappeared from her face so quickly that Khloe wondered whether she had imagined it.
Then Isabella tore one strap from her own crimson gown.
She dragged her fingernails down her shoulder.
She threw herself beside an overturned chair and began sobbing.
“Help me!”
Khloe stared at her.
Isabella’s tears appeared instantly.
“Someone help me!”
Footsteps thundered outside the suite.
Khloe tried to straighten, but a sharp cramp seized her abdomen.
Warmth spread beneath the palm pressed against her dress.
She looked down.
A thin streak of blood had appeared against the pale fabric.
The door flew open.
Sebastian Thorne entered first.
Khloe’s husband still wore the black tuxedo he had chosen for the charity gala downstairs.
His bow tie hung loose around his collar.
Behind him came two nurses, a hospital administrator, and Celia Thorne, Sebastian’s mother.
Sebastian’s gaze moved from Khloe to Isabella.
Isabella was curled against the floor with one hand covering her torn shoulder.
“Sebastian,” she whispered.
Khloe watched her husband cross the room.
He went to Isabella first.
The realization hurt almost as much as the marble edge against her spine.
“What happened?”
Sebastian lowered himself beside Isabella.
Isabella grabbed his sleeve.
“She attacked me.”
Khloe felt the room tilt.
“She came at me when I tried to leave.”
Isabella’s voice trembled with perfectly measured fear.
“I only put my hands up to protect myself.”
“That’s a lie.”
Khloe barely recognized her own voice.
Sebastian looked toward her.
His expression changed when he saw the blood.
“Khloe?”
“Our baby.”
The words finally pulled him away from Isabella.
He reached Khloe as her knees buckled.
One of the nurses caught her other arm.
“We need a stretcher immediately.”
The nurse pressed a button near the door.
“Possible placental trauma in the executive maternity suite.”
Isabella began crying louder.
“I didn’t touch her.”
Khloe gripped Sebastian’s lapel.
“She kicked me.”
Sebastian’s face went still.
Celia stepped between them.
“Khloe, this is not the time for accusations.”
Khloe turned her head slowly.
Celia’s silver gown shimmered beneath the suite’s recessed lighting.
The older woman looked composed.
Too composed.
“Your grandchild may be in danger.”
“I am aware of that.”
Celia glanced at Isabella.
“We are also surrounded by witnesses who heard Isabella call for help.”
“They heard her after she attacked me.”
Khloe tried to take a deeper breath.
The pain tightened again.
The baby still had not moved.
A stretcher arrived with an emergency obstetric team.
Dr. Evelyn Shaw pushed through the doorway.
She had delivered hundreds of children at St. Aurelia Medical Center, but Khloe had never seen fear cross her face before.
“What happened?”
“Blunt-force trauma to the back and abdomen,” the nurse answered.
Khloe caught Dr. Shaw’s wrist.
“Please tell me she’s alive.”
Dr. Shaw placed a hand over Khloe’s.
“We are going to check her heartbeat right now.”
They eased Khloe onto the stretcher.
Sebastian stayed beside her.
For several seconds, Khloe believed he had finally understood.
Then Isabella spoke from behind him.
“She threatened to ruin you.”
Sebastian stopped.
Khloe stared up at him.
Isabella pushed herself unsteadily to her feet.
“She said she would destroy your company and take the baby where you would never find her.”
“I never said that.”
Isabella flinched as though Khloe had shouted.
“She has been unstable for weeks.”
“That is enough.”
Sebastian’s voice was low.
Khloe waited for him to defend her.
Instead, his eyes remained on Isabella.
“Security will determine what happened.”
Khloe’s pulse quickened.
“The cameras.”
Everyone looked toward her.
“There are cameras in this suite.”
The administrator cleared his throat.
“Mrs. Thorne, cameras are not normally permitted inside patient sleeping areas.”
“This suite was being used as a donor reception room until tonight.”
Khloe pointed weakly toward the ceiling.
“I saw the installation crew this afternoon.”
The administrator’s face tightened.
Isabella’s crying stopped for half a second.
Khloe saw it.
So did someone else.
At the security station three floors below, Mara Voss leaned toward a wall of monitors.
Mara had served twelve years as a military investigator before becoming St. Aurelia’s director of protective services.
She rarely reacted visibly to anything.
Now she replayed the footage from Executive Suite Fourteen.
The first camera showed Isabella shoving Khloe.
The second captured the kick.
The third showed Isabella tearing her own dress and throwing herself onto the floor.
Mara watched it twice.
Then she reached for the secure phone.
Before she could lift it, every monitor went black.
The security station lights flickered.
A warning appeared across the central screen.
REMOTE ADMINISTRATOR OVERRIDE.
Mara’s fingers froze over the keyboard.
Only three people possessed that level of access.
One was the hospital’s chief technology officer.
One was Sebastian Thorne.
The third had died eleven months earlier.
Mara pulled a small external drive from her pocket and inserted it into the local console.
She began copying the temporary camera cache before the remote command could erase it.
Twenty percent.
Thirty-four percent.
Forty-nine percent.
The progress bar stopped.
FILE CORRUPTED.
Mara swore under her breath.
A shadow moved behind the frosted glass of the security office.
She spun around.
The corridor was empty.
When she looked back, the footage had vanished.
Upstairs, the obstetric team rushed Khloe toward the private surgical wing.
The hallway ceiling lights blurred above her.
Sebastian walked beside the stretcher, but his phone kept vibrating.
He looked at the screen.
Khloe saw Isabella’s name.
A message preview appeared beneath it.
I am sorry she found out about us.
Khloe stopped breathing.
Sebastian turned the phone facedown.
“What did she mean?”
“This is not the time.”
“What did she mean, Sebastian?”
Dr. Shaw interrupted them.
“I need everyone except medical staff out of the elevator.”
“I’m her husband.”
“Then act like one and let us stabilize your wife.”
The elevator doors opened.
Sebastian released the stretcher.
Khloe stared at him as the doors began closing.
He looked afraid.
He also looked guilty.
“Khloe, I can explain.”
The silver doors met between them.
Inside the elevator, Dr. Shaw attached a fetal monitor.
Static cracked through the speaker.
Then came a faint, rapid heartbeat.
Khloe sobbed.
“She’s alive.”
“For now.”
Dr. Shaw’s expression remained grave.
“We need to determine whether the placenta has separated.”
Khloe pressed both hands over her stomach.
“Do whatever you have to do.”
The elevator descended into the restricted maternal surgery level.
One nurse adjusted the intravenous line.
Another cut away the stained portion of Khloe’s gown.
Dr. Shaw leaned closer.
“Did Isabella kick you directly?”
“Yes.”
“Was there anyone else inside the suite?”
“No.”
Khloe remembered Isabella glancing toward the service door before the attack.
“Maybe.”
Dr. Shaw looked at her.
“What do you mean?”
“She kept looking behind me.”
The elevator opened.
They rushed Khloe toward an examination room.
Just before the doors closed, Khloe noticed a man standing at the far end of the corridor.
He wore a hospital maintenance uniform.
His face was turned away.
One hand held a black access tablet.
The other held the missing diamond strap from Isabella’s gown.
Khloe tried to point.
“That man.”
The nurse looked back.
The corridor was empty.
“What man?”
Khloe’s vision darkened.
The fetal monitor began sounding an alarm.
Staff members surrounded her.
“Khloe, stay with me.”
Dr. Shaw’s voice came from far away.
“We are losing the heartbeat.”
Khloe fought to remain conscious.
She thought of the nursery waiting at home.
The cream-colored walls.
The hand-painted stars.
The tiny silver nameplate Sebastian had not allowed her to hang because they had not yet agreed on a name.
She thought of Isabella’s calm face before the door opened.
Someone had known exactly when Sebastian would arrive.
Someone had known where the cameras were located.
Someone had believed the recordings could be erased.
As the anesthesiologist placed a mask near Khloe’s face, a security alarm sounded across the surgical wing.
Mara Voss appeared outside the examination room.
Blood ran from a cut above her eyebrow.
She held the external drive in one hand.
“Do not let anyone remove Mrs. Thorne from this floor.”
A nurse tried to close the door.
Mara blocked it.
“I recovered eleven seconds of footage.”
Khloe forced her eyes open.
“Did it show Isabella?”
“Yes.”
Mara looked toward the corridor behind her.
“It also showed someone else.”
May you like
The lights went out.
In the darkness, a hand closed around Khloe’s ankle.
