Chapter 2

Last night, I'd secretly called my mother and told her I was pregnant.

She'd been so overjoyed she skipped her ER shift at dawn and rushed over with folic acid and tiny baby clothes—

Only to walk into the Hawthorne Manor and find bodyguards pinning me down.

"Mom!" I tore free with a burst of strength I didn't know I had and staggered toward her. "Save my baby!"

The second she saw me—white-faced, crying, my hair in tangles—her expression changed.

Then she pulled me behind her in one sharp motion, one arm shielding my stomach as she faced my in-laws in the grand hall.

"Mr. and Mrs. Hawthorne." Her voice was cold enough to cut. "My daughter did not marry into this house to be manhandled like a criminal. Start talking. Now."

Pressed against her back, I finally managed to breathe.

My mother had raised me alone. She had fought for everything we had, and she had never once failed me.

More importantly, she was an OB-GYN. She believed in scans, bloodwork, evidence—not in some diseased flower sitting in a pot.

With her here, the Hawthornes couldn't hide behind superstition.

And this time, they weren't taking my baby without a fight.

But when my mother demanded an explanation, Conrad didn't even bother to argue.

He tapped his cane once and tilted his chin toward the table.

"See for yourself, Hilary."

My mother's gaze followed.

The Crimson Orchid sat there like a corpse—petals collapsed into slick, black sludge, the air around it sour with rot.

I felt her grip on my arm tighten—then go rigid.

"Mom, don't look at that. Look at this!" I lunged, snatched the amniocentesis report off the floor, and shoved it into her hands. "The results are clean—healthy fetus, no genetic disorders, everything—"

My words strangled off.

Because she wasn't reading.

Her eyes were locked on the flower, her face draining to bone-white.

Then, like the paper burned her, she opened her fingers and let the report slip back onto the carpet.

"Mom…?" My voice turned thin. "What are you doing?"

She turned to me slowly. The woman who had taught me to trust science looked at me with raw, unmistakable fear.

"End it, Claire," she said, voice shaking. "The orchid's black. You can't keep this baby."

It hit harder than anything Conrad had ever said.

Her. An OB-GYN. My mother—choosing a rotting plant over the ultrasound, the heartbeat, the numbers.

I stared at her, stunned, and my voice cracked.

"You're a doctor. You've heard the heartbeat. You've seen the scans. Since when does a flower outrank medicine?"

"That's the Crimson Orchid," she whispered, eyes darting away from mine, fixed on that fetid pot like it could bite. "When it turns black, there's no way out. Please… just listen to me."

Margaret set her teacup down with a soft clink and a cruel little snort.

"See? Even your mother knows better than you do."

Something inside me finally snapped.

This cursed flower had taken my first two babies. Now it had turned the only person I trusted into their shield.

"It's not my child that's wrong—it's this damn thing!" I surged forward, eyes burning, reaching for the glass case.

"Let it die!"

I didn't even make it past the table.

Two bodyguards caught my arms, twisted them behind my back, and slammed me down onto the carpet.

"Let me go!" I fought like an animal, twisting toward my mother. "Mom—help me!"

She did rush in.

But not to pull them off.

She dropped beside me and forced my shoulders down with both hands, her tears splashing hot against my cheek.

"Claire, stop!" she pleaded, voice shaking. "Just listen to them. I'm trying to keep you alive."

The pressure of her hands broke something clean through my chest.

The first two times, I'd been strapped down alone—but at least I'd had the lie of home waiting afterward.

This time, home was the one holding me still for the knife.

The fight drained out of me. I stopped looking at her and wrapped both arms around my stomach, sobbing until my throat burned.

Margaret took my silence as surrender.

She reached into a medical kit and drew out a cloudy syringe, flicking it with practiced fingers.

The sight of the needle snapped my instincts back to life. I choked out the only bargain I had left.

"Margaret—please. Let me keep him, and I'll leave. I'll vanish. You'll never see me again. He's only—he's only—"

"Four months," Margaret cut in, almost bored, as she pushed air from the syringe. "And the orchid is black. Defective. We end it now."

Conrad didn't speak. He just nodded once, leaning on his cane like this was a routine household decision.

Panic strangled me. My body remembered—cold metal, antiseptic, cramps like knives.

Margaret grabbed a fistful of my hair and yanked my head back. The guards cinched my arms tighter. The needle slid toward my vein—

"BANG—!"

The front door blew inward under a brutal kick.

A voice tore through the room like a gunshot.

"GET AWAY FROM HER!"

My eyes flew open.

Past the bodies and the syringe, through the wrecked doorway—

Adrian. My husband.