Chapter 7
The woman’s name at our wedding was Rebecca Shaw.
Ryan introduced her as a distant cousin.
At the hospital, she called herself Nurse Anna Reed.
Neither identity was real.
Her actual name was Rebecca Mercer.
Dr. Mercer’s daughter.
She had helped deliver Noah.
She had also processed the DNA samples ordered by the court.
“We need a new test at an independent laboratory,” Elena said.
Until then, the false result could threaten my custody.
Diane’s plan had changed.
If she could not take Noah through an adoption agreement, she would claim he was not mine.
The judge allowed Noah to remain with me under constant supervision.
Mara and I moved into a protected apartment arranged by the district attorney.
No one except Elena and two detectives knew the address.
That night, someone slid an envelope under the door.
Inside was Noah’s hospital bracelet.
The bracelet I had seen fastened around his ankle after birth.
A note was attached.
Ask what happened to the other baby.
The building went into lockdown.
Security footage showed no visitor in the hallway.
The envelope had been placed inside the apartment before we arrived.
I examined the bracelet.
The identification number did not match Noah’s discharge records.
Elena contacted the hospital.
Another boy had been born eleven minutes after Noah.
His mother was Sophie Lane.
Sophie had delivered at the same hospital months earlier than her husband claimed.
Her current pregnancy was fake.
I called her directly.
At first, she refused to answer.
Then she began crying.
“My baby died,” she said.
But there was no death certificate.
Sophie admitted Ryan had approached her during pregnancy and offered financial help. After delivery, nurses told her that her son had stopped breathing.
She never saw his body.
Dr. Mercer arranged a private cremation.
Then he paid Sophie to leave the state and pretend she was still pregnant.
“Why?” I asked.
“They said someone would kill me if people knew the truth.”
The pieces formed a horrifying picture.
Two boys were born that night.
One to me.
One to Sophie.
Rebecca Mercer had access to both babies.
If bracelets and records were switched, the child in my arms might be Sophie’s son.
And my biological baby might still be alive somewhere else.
The second DNA test confirmed the truth.
Noah was not biologically mine.
He was Sophie’s child.
I sat beside his crib and felt the world split open.
He was still my son.
I had carried another baby, but Noah was the child I had fed, rocked, and protected.
Sophie arrived with a detective.
When she saw him, she covered her mouth.
I expected her to demand that I hand him over.
Instead, she sat beside me.
“They stole both our babies,” she whispered.
She touched Noah’s tiny hand and broke down.
The district attorney promised that no immediate custody change would happen. Both of us were victims of a criminal scheme.
Our priority was finding my biological son.
Dr. Mercer refused to speak.
Diane laughed when detectives confronted her.
Ryan remained missing.
Then Melissa remembered something.
Six weeks after Noah’s birth, Diane had planned to attend a family gathering at a private estate. She called it a welcoming ceremony.
The estate belonged to Holloway.
Police obtained a warrant.
Inside his house, they found an empty nursery, dozens of fake documents, and a wall covered with photographs of potential mothers.
In a locked safe was an adoption certificate for a baby named Daniel Hale.
The child’s fingerprints matched those taken from my son immediately after birth.
My biological baby had been registered as Melissa’s child.
But Melissa had never seen him.
Someone else had him now.
Police found a recent photograph on Holloway’s computer.
Ryan stood outside a motel holding a baby carrier.
Behind him was a road sign.
May you like
Mara recognized the place.
It was twenty miles from the town where Emily Carter had disappeared.
