Chương 2
Her gaze found the ribbon bars on his chest.
Not his face.
His ribbons.
“Your command did.”
The words landed quietly.
That made them worse.
The elevator reached the penthouse floor.
The machinery above the doors settled.
Adrian heard Elena take one thin, painful breath.
The doors snapped open.
Dr. Vivian Mercer stood inside.
Forty-eight. Dark hair in the severe bun she had worn throughout Elena’s pregnancy. Charcoal coat over scrubs. Pale surgical gloves. Controlled face.
A small mark of blood darkened the glove over her right thumb.
She did not look at Elena first.
She looked at the girl’s wristband.
Then she lifted her eyes to Adrian.
“Commander,” she said, “give me the baby your wife stole.”
Adrian had been frightened three times in his adult life badly enough to remember the exact physical sensation.
Once over the Arabian Sea when an engine warning appeared at night and the aircraft rolled harder than the instruments said it should.
Once when the casualty-assistance officer called about his younger brother.
Once that morning, when Dr. Mercer had taken off her mask after Elena’s delivery and told him their daughter had not survived.
This was different.
The fear stayed still.
His body stayed still with it.
“What did you do to my wife?”
Vivian glanced at Elena’s shoulder.
“I defended myself.”
Elena made a rough sound that might have been a laugh if breathing had not hurt.
Vivian’s expression did not change.
“She entered a restricted neonatal area. She assaulted a member of staff. She removed an infant who is not hers.”
“You stabbed her.”
“She came at me holding a surgical instrument.”
Elena whispered, “Liar.”
Vivian finally looked at her.
Something passed through her face then. Not rage. Not panic.
Disappointment.
It was almost worse.
Adrian touched the building panel beside him and disabled the elevator door hold. The doors began to close.
Vivian stepped across the threshold.
He blocked her.
“Do not come into my home.”
“You need to listen carefully.”
“I am listening.”
“That child is medically fragile.”
“So are both of them.”
“She requires monitored care.”
“My wife requires monitored care.”
“And your wife removed her from it.”
Adrian watched Vivian’s hands.
No weapon.
The gloves were wrong, though.
He had spent enough time around military medicine to know that people did not wear surgical gloves for elevator rides unless they had forgotten they were wearing them or expected to touch something they did not want to touch barehanded.
“Take the gloves off.”
Vivian’s eyes narrowed slightly.
“What?”
“Take them off and put them on the floor.”
“Commander, this is not one of your aircraft.”
“No. It’s my home.”
He heard Brooks in the earpiece.
“Thirty seconds. Building security with me. Civilian EMS staged downstairs. Do not touch her unless you have to.”
Vivian heard none of it.
She looked around Adrian toward Elena.
“Elena, give me Claire’s baby.”
Elena’s face tightened.
Adrian caught the name.
“Claire.”
Vivian’s attention returned to him.
“My daughter.”
There it was.
Not an explanation. A claim.
Adrian had met Claire Mercer once, months earlier, in a hospital coffee shop. At least he thought he had. A thin woman in an oversized sweater had approached Vivian while Adrian waited for Elena’s ultrasound. Vivian had introduced her as her daughter. Claire had looked tired. Adrian had assumed graduate school, night shifts, ordinary life.
He had not known she was pregnant.
“You told me our daughter died this morning.”
Vivian said nothing.
“You looked me in the face.”
“She did.”
Behind him Elena shifted.
“No.”
Adrian kept his eyes on Vivian.
“You told me Elena delivered a boy and a girl. You told me the girl couldn’t be resuscitated.”
“I told you what the records showed.”
“You were standing in the operating room.”
“I was standing in several rooms.”
“You were her doctor.”
“I was the maternal-fetal consultant.”
“Same question.”
“No,” Vivian said. “Not the same question.”
The precision in her correction struck him as grotesque.
Then the black gift box slid off the table behind him.
Elena had reached for it.
Vivian’s face changed.
Only slightly.
Adrian saw it.
Vivian saw that he saw it.
“Don’t,” she said.
Elena pulled the box against the blanket.
Adrian did not turn.
“What’s in it?”
Elena’s breathing came shallow and fast.
“Proof.”
Vivian stepped forward.
Adrian put one hand against her sternum and stopped her.
She froze.
His voice stayed low.
“That was your one.”
The elevator opened again behind her.
Two building security officers filled the doorway. Daniel Brooks stood between them in civilian clothes with a trauma bag slung across one shoulder.
His eyes went first to Adrian.
Then Elena.
Then the babies.
Then the blood on Vivian’s glove.
“Ma’am,” one security officer said, “step away from the resident.”
Vivian’s shoulders lowered.
Not surrender.
Calculation.
“You’re making this much worse.”
Adrian almost laughed.
Instead he said, “For who?”
No one answered.
Brooks crossed to Elena.
He did not ask permission before looking at the wound, but he did ask before touching her.
“Elena, it’s Daniel. I need the blanket moved off your shoulder.”
“No.”
“The babies stay with you.”
“No one takes them.”
“No one takes them while I’m touching you.”
She looked at Adrian.
He nodded.
Only then did she let Brooks work.
The change in her trust was small enough that another person might not have noticed.
Adrian noticed.
He would notice variations of it for months.
Police arrived nine minutes later. Civilian paramedics followed. The penthouse, which Elena had spent two years complaining was too quiet, filled with radios, medical packaging, shoe covers, questions, and people trying not to look at the blood on the cream rug.
The twins were transferred into warmed transport bassinets.
Elena fought them until Brooks bent close and told her what her oxygen saturation was.
“Eighty-nine,” he said.
“I don’t care.”
“I do.”
“They’ll separate them.”
“They may.”
“No.”
“Elena.”
“No.”
Brooks glanced at Adrian.
May you like
Adrian crouched beside her.
She looked furious with him before he said anything.
