Chapter 1 - Seventeen Silences
The floor of our Annapolis kitchen was dark grey slate, imported from Portugal. Wade had chosen it because he said it made the house look like a magazine.
As I lay on those cold, polished stones, staring up at the vaulted ceiling and the hanging copper pots we had never used to cook a meal together, I reached for my phone. My hands were shaking so violently I dropped it twice.
The first contraction hit like a physical blow, wringing the air from my lungs until I couldn't scream.
I dialed Wade’s private number. It went straight to voicemail after three rings.
Call again.
Ring. Ring. Ring. Voicemail.
I called seven times in four minutes. Then I dialed Tessa’s number—the business contact he had insisted I add to my phone three months ago when she was hired. It rang once and was abruptly cut off. Switched to silent.
They were at the vineyard. The candles were lit. The wine was flowing. And my calls were an inconvenience blinking silently on a screen beneath a dark wooden table in Napa Valley.
I stopped calling Wade.
I dialed 911.
"Emergency," I gasped into the receiver, pressing my phone against my ear while my left hand gripped the island leg so hard my fingernails bent. "I'm thirty-four weeks pregnant... triplets. My water broke... severe bleeding... I'm alone."
The dispatcher’s voice was instantly crisp, clear, and steady—a human thread anchoring me to the earth while my body tore itself apart. "I have your location, ma'am. Paramedics are en route. Stay on the line with me. Do not try to stand."
While the sirens wailed in the distance, my phone buzzed on the slate floor.
It wasn't Wade. It was an automated notification from our home security system: Front Gate Unlocked via Mobile App.
He had unlocked the gate from California so a catering delivery or a package could be dropped off, completely oblivious to the fact that ten minutes later, three emergency vehicles slammed their brakes in our driveway, lights flashing red and white across the dark bay waters.
The paramedics broke the front glass to reach me.
Within twenty minutes, I was strapped into the back of an ambulance, oxygen mask pressed over my face, while a young EMT held my hand and monitored three faint, erratic heartbeats through a portable doppler.
"Hold on, Maren," he kept saying. "Just hold on."
By the time we reached the hospital, my specialist, Dr. Aris Thorne, was waiting in surgical scrubs. Her face was pale, her eyes sharp and fierce.
"Her blood pressure is critical," Dr. Thorne shouted as they wheeled my gurney down the fluorescent hallway toward the operating theater. "We can't wait for anesthesia to fully take. Prepare for an emergency C-section. Where is the husband?"
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"He's in California," I whispered through the plastic mask. "He's not coming."
Dr. Thorne paused for half a second, looking down at me. She didn't offer empty pity. She simply reached down, squeezed my shoulder with a gloved hand, and said, "Then we do this together, Maren. Look at me. Don't look at the lights."
