Chapter 2: What She Kept Under Her Pillow
Part 2 ⬇️
The paramedics took Irene on a stretcher.
I held her hand until they made me let go.
"She's stable," one of them said.
"But we need to move."
The baby.
I couldn't stop thinking about the baby.
While the officers led Margaret and Carla out in handcuffs, Mom was still talking.
"Austin, call our lawyer.
This is a misunderstanding.
She provoked us—"
I turned my back on her.
At the hospital, the doctor pulled me aside.
"Your wife is going to be okay.
But Mr.
Wentworth…
she told us this wasn't the first time."
I went still.
"She said she didn't report it because she was afraid of what it would do to your family."
I walked back to her room alone.
Irene was awake, her face bruised, one hand resting on her stomach.
"How long?" I asked quietly.
She looked at the window.
"Irene.
How long has this been happening?"
Her voice barely came out.
"Since the third week your mother moved in."
Three months.
She had hidden three months of this from me.
Then she reached under her pillow and pulled out a small envelope.
"I was going to leave this for you," she whispered.
"In case something happened to me tonight."
My hands were shaking as I took it.
May you like
I didn't open it yet.
Because what she said next stopped me completely.
