My Husband Had a Child With Someone Else While I Was Carrying His Chapter 08

My Husband Had a Child With Someone Else While I Was Carrying His Chapter 08

For the next few days, I played it unnaturally quiet.

I stopped bringing up the security cameras, and I stopped turning away the meals Janet carried in.

When Lucas came to see me, I even managed a small smile for him. He took it to mean I had finally

come to my senses, and the tired lines around his eyes eased.

“That’s my good girl, Rachel.”

He kissed my forehead, his voice thick with affection. “The welcome party is tomorrow, and I’ll

probably be tied up the whole day. You stay put and behave, and I’ll come see you the minute I’m

done.”

I nodded along. “Okay. Go do what you need to do.’

The second Lucas left, I pulled out the old phone.

Using the hospital’s official complaint line, I filed a formal grievance under my own name, as a

patient.

The reason I gave was that a failure in the hospital’s equipment had delayed my treatment, and I demanded that the system logs from that night be pulled so responsibility could be assigned.

Because it now counted as a medical dispute, the hospital’s legal department had no choice but to step in, and with my lawyer’s help, I finally got my hands on the system log they had buried.

I put in my earphones and opened the recording. The background noise was heavy, but the voices in

the room still came through clearly.

“The one in your belly, I bet it’ll turn out this cute too someday. If it makes it out alive, that is.”

That was Sally.

Right after came the crash of something heavy, hitting the floor. “Quit the act. Nobody’s that

delicate.”

Then there was the sound of Summer yanking out the call cord, and on the recording, it grated

worse than anything else.

“Rachel, Lucas knew hours ago that you were doing badly today. But the second I put a heat patch

on the baby, he dropped everything and came running.”

Sally’s smug laughter drilled straight into my ear.

I saved the recording to the cloud, and then I had my lawyer look into Janet’s bank records.

Sure enough, the day after it all happened, Summer’s account had wired Janet fifty thousand dollars. Every last piece of evidence had clicked into place, and the case against them was finally airtight.

I watched the sky outside the window go slowly dark.

Tomorrow was the day the Halls family threw their lavish welcome party, when they would gather. at that grand hotel and soak up everyone’s blessings, and at the height of their triumph, I would be the one to tear their pretty little veneer to shreds with my own hands.

I called my lawyer, James Lane. “James, is all the evidence in order?”

“It’s all ready, Ms. Bennett. We can go public whenever you want.”

“Good.”

I hung up and dragged a small suitcase out from under the bed. It held the clothes and papers I had quietly ordered through a courier over the past few days.

I pulled on a loose black trench coat that completely covered the slight swell of my belly.

When I pushed the door open, Janet was down at the far end of the hall on the phone.

I tugged the brim of my hat low, kept to the blind spots the cameras couldn’t reach, and slipped into the stairwell. I walked slowly, but every step I took landed sure.

Lucas believed he could control it all. He was certain I would turn into some bitter, sulking woman

who would swallow her pride for a man who had never loved her, but he was wrong.

What my child needed was not a father who showed up late every single time, and a rotten,

hollowed-out family was the last thing my child needed at all.

I pushed through the back door of the hospital and pulled in a deep breath of the cold air outside.

The night wind cut through me, so I wrapped the coat tighter and flagged down a cab.

“The Grand Hyatt, please.”