PART 6
All those months.
The exhaustion.
The gaslighting.
The whispers about my “instability.”
The sleeping pills Spencer insisted I take.
The doctors Eleanor conveniently recommended.
The baby monitors turning off.
They had been building a case against me.
A nervous mother makes the child sick.
No.
They were trying to make me look sick.
Rosa suddenly stepped beside me with Matthew still in her arms.
“Ms. Valerie,” she whispered urgently, “we need to leave now.”
But I couldn’t move.
My eyes were locked on Spencer.
“How long?” I asked quietly.
He swallowed hard.
“Valerie—”
“How long have you been lying to me?”
He rubbed both hands over his face like a man collapsing under years of pressure.
Then finally:
“Since your first pregnancy.”
The air disappeared from my lungs.
I remembered that pregnancy.
The blood.
The emergency delivery.
Waking up drugged and empty while Eleanor held my hand telling me my baby had died from complications.
I had never even seen the body.
Because there wasn’t one.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
Tears finally filled Spencer’s eyes.
“They told me it was temporary.”
May you like
“Who told you?”
He looked toward Eleanor.
