Chapter 3: What My Mother Knew
The name on the screen was Dr.
Harlan Webb.
I hadn't heard that name in two years.
My husband had told me Dr.
Webb had retired.
That his practice had closed.
That there was no point trying to reach him.
My husband was still staring at the phone.
"Give that to me," he said.
His voice had changed.
The calm was gone.
My friend stepped back, keeping the phone between us.
"Who is Dr.
Webb?" she asked me.
"My OB," I said.
"My first one.
Before Daniel told me to switch."
The man who had stood up — I would learn his name was Robert, a colleague of my husband's from his firm — hadn't moved.
He was still holding his own phone.
Still watching.
"Daniel," Robert said quietly.
"I think you should let her answer the call."
"Stay out of this."
"I don't think I will."
Daniel turned on him.
"You came to my home.
You will stay out of my family's business."
"I came to your home," Robert said, "and I'm looking at a pregnant woman with bruises on both wrists.
So no.
I won't stay out of it."
Daniel's mother moved toward Robert.
"You don't understand the situation."
"Then explain it to me."
She opened her mouth.
Nothing came out.
My friend pressed the phone into my hand.
I answered it.
"Hello?"
"Thank God." Dr.
Webb's voice was older than I remembered.
Quieter.
But the urgency in it was immediate.
"I've been trying to reach you since last night.
Are you somewhere safe?"
I looked at Daniel.
"Not exactly," I said.
"Is he there?"
"Yes."
A pause.
"Can you get out of the house?"
Daniel stepped forward.
"Who is that?
Give me the phone."
I turned my back to him.
"She's not giving you the phone," my friend said from somewhere behind me.
"This is my house—"
"Then act like it." Robert's voice.
Flat.
Final.
I pressed the phone closer to my ear.
"Dr.
Webb.
Why have you been calling?"
Another pause.
Longer this time.
"Because three weeks ago," he said, "a woman came to my home.
She said she was your sister-in-law.
She asked me questions about your prenatal records.
Specific questions.
About your due date.
About whether the pregnancy was viable."
My hand went cold.
"She wanted to know," he continued, "what would happen medically if you were under sustained physical stress during the third trimester."
The room was completely silent.
I hadn't realized I'd stopped moving until I felt the wall at my back.
"She asked what kind of stress?" I said.
"Yes."
"And you're telling me this now because—"
"Because I told her nothing," he said.
"And because two days later, someone accessed my patient records system.
Your file was opened.
Nothing was taken.
But someone looked."
Daniel's sister had gone very still near the kitchen counter.
I looked at her hands.
They were pressed flat against the countertop.
"Daniel," I said.
I didn't raise my voice.
"Did your sister go to see my doctor?"
"That's insane."
"Did she."
"You're being paranoid.
This is exactly what I mean — you take everything and you twist it—"
"She went to his house," I said.
"He remembers her."
Daniel looked at his sister.
His sister looked at the floor.
That was the only answer I needed.
Robert had already stepped toward the front door.
He held it open without being asked, the morning air coming in cold and clean from outside.
My friend put her hand on my back.
"Come on," she said softly.
"Let's get you out."
I took one step toward the door.
Daniel moved to block me.
"You are not leaving this house with my child."
Robert put himself between us.
He was not a large man, but he stood very straight.
"Move," Daniel said.
"No," Robert said.
Daniel looked around the room.
At his mother.
At his sister.
At the two guests who had not moved, had not spoken, had simply watched everything unfold with the stillness of people who understood exactly what they were witnessing.
Nobody moved toward him.
His mother looked away first.
I walked past him.
I walked out the front door.
The cold air hit my face and I kept walking, my friend's hand still on my back, Dr.
Webb still on the line, the sound of Daniel's voice behind me saying my name once, twice, then not again.
I didn't look back.
But as I reached my friend's car, she said something quietly that stopped me for just a moment.
"He called someone right before you walked out.
I saw him dial."
I looked at her.
"Who?"
She shook her head.
May you like
"I don't know.
But he was smiling when he did it."
