The silence that followed Mark’s plea was not empty; it was heavy, suffocating, filled with the phantom cries of a baby I was told had died. My hands shook so violently that I had to sit back down on the sofa, clutching the child—my child—to my chest. Mark remained on his knees, his forehead pressed against the cold hardwood floor.
“You stole him,” I whispered. The words felt like shards of glass in my throat. “You and Claire. You stole my son.”
“It wasn’t supposed to be a theft,” Mark sobbed, his voice muffled by the floor. “The doctor… the hospital… they said he had a respiratory complication. They said he was weak. Claire was obsessed, Andrea. After her third miscarriage, she became unhinged. She found a doctor who owed her family a favor. They told you he died so they could process the paperwork for a ‘private adoption’ without any questions. I didn’t know until the night he was born. I swear, I didn’t know the extent of it until they handed him to me and I saw your name on the internal transfer sheet.”
