“That is not my signature,” Dr.
Samuel Hart said.
The forged medical report trembled between his fingers.
My newborn slept against my chest, unaware that a single sheet of paper had destroyed the life he should have been born into.
Before I could answer, the delivery-room door opened.
Ethan stood there in a rain-darkened coat, his hair wet and his expression irritated rather than worried.
Margaret was directly behind him, perfectly composed despite the storm.
Vanessa lingered in the hallway wearing a cream coat I recognized from my own closet.
For one absurd second, none of them looked at the baby.
Ethan looked at me.
“Why did the hospital call me?”
Dr.
Hart lowered the report.
“Because your number was still listed as Mrs.
Vale’s emergency contact.”
“We’re divorced.”
“I’m aware.”
The doctor’s voice had hardened.
He stepped between Ethan and my bed, blocking their view of the folder.
Ethan glanced around the room as if my labor had inconvenienced him.
“Is the child healthy?”
The child.
Not my son.
Not our son.
I tightened my arm around the baby.
“He is healthy,” Dr.
Hart said.
“And there is a serious matter we need to discuss.”
Margaret entered before she was invited.
Her eyes fell on the crescent-shaped mark beneath the baby’s left collarbone.
She stopped.
It lasted less than a second, but I saw it—the sharp intake of breath, the slight parting of her lips, the fear she immediately buried.
She recognized the mark.
Dr.
Hart noticed too.
“Mrs.
Vale,” he said to her, “you know what that is.”
Margaret recovered quickly.
“A birthmark.
Babies have them.”
“Ethan had the same one when I delivered him.”
Vanessa’s gaze snapped toward Margaret.
Ethan finally looked at the baby.
Dr.
Hart continued.
“Your father had it as well.
I treated him for nearly twenty years.”
Ethan took one step closer.
His face was unreadable.
“That doesn’t prove anything.”
“No,” Dr.
Hart said.
“It does not.
DNA will prove it.”
Margaret’s heels clicked against the floor as she moved beside her son.
“There will be no test.
