After three years of infertility and another year of IVF, I finally became pregnant—and six months later, standing barefoot behind a half-closed library door, I learned the four babies inside me had never been mine.
Chapter 3
The private hospital admitted me under strict confidentiality.
Dr. Harris met me personally.
A maternal-fetal medicine team explained every medical option, every risk, and every legal protection available to me. After independent review, I made a decision concerning the pregnancy based on my deteriorating health and the fact that it had been created without my informed consent.
There was nothing easy about it.
Nothing triumphant.
Anyone who believed revenge could make such a choice simple had never stood where I stood.
Before treatment began, I rested my hands on my stomach one final time.
For months, I had sung to those babies.
They were innocent.
So was I.
That truth made the grief almost unbearable.
Dr. Harris held my hand.
“You are allowed to save your own life,” she said.
I closed my eyes.
When I woke many hours later, my body felt strangely light and terribly empty.
I cried then.
Not quietly.
Not bravely.
I cried until there seemed to be nothing left inside me.
Margaret sat beside the bed.
When I finally opened my eyes, she asked, “Are you sure you want tonight’s disclosure to proceed?”
“Yes.”
“You can stop it.”
“No.”
“Scarlett, once it happens, there’s no putting this back in a drawer.”
I looked at the rain tracing the hospital window.
“Neither is what they did to me.”
That evening, five hundred people gathered inside the ballroom of the Starlight Hotel.
I wasn’t there.
I didn’t need to be.
Carter arrived in a custom tuxedo looking every inch the man magazines described as one of America’s rising corporate stars.
Selene stood nearby in blue silk.
Sienna mingled with investors.
Arthur Montgomery waited to announce the merger.
Edward Hale, Delilah’s seventy-year-old father, had flown from Boston for the charity portion of the gala.
At eight fifteen, the lights dimmed.
Carter walked toward the stage.
The giant screens behind him came alive.
He expected a polished film celebrating three decades of Sterling Industries.
Instead, an audio waveform appeared.
Then Tyler’s voice filled the ballroom.
“Four women, four embryos, one wife carrying all of them.”
Every conversation stopped.
Carter froze.
His own voice came next.
“Scarlett is occupying the position. She’ll do what she always does—take the pain and keep quiet.”
Someone gasped.
Carter spun toward the control booth.
“Turn that off!”
The technicians tried.
The presentation continued.
Verified clinic records appeared on the screens.
Four embryos.
Four egg donors.
One father.
Delilah Hale.
Sienna Brooks.
Selene Miller.
Clara Montgomery.
Edward Hale stood so abruptly his chair crashed backward.
“My daughter?”
His voice shook the room.
Carter turned toward him.
“Mr. Hale, I can explain.”
“You used tissue she preserved during cancer treatment?”
“She gave permission before—”
“She gave permission to create a child with you under circumstances you never disclosed!”
Carter backed away.
The screen changed.
Photographs of private contracts appeared.
Then pages from the betting ledger.
Gender.
Birth order.
Estimated weights.
Dollar amounts.
Cruel jokes.
Selene covered her mouth.
Sienna looked at Carter.
“You told me I was the only one.”
Selene whirled toward her.
“The only one?”
Sienna’s face twisted. “He said after Scarlett delivered, he was leaving her.”
Selene laughed once, hysterically.
“He told me that.”
Across the room, Clara Montgomery stood beside her father.
Arthur Montgomery did not shout.
That made him more frightening.
He walked to the stage microphone.
“Effective immediately, Montgomery Capital is withdrawing from all pending transactions with Sterling Industries.”
Carter lunged toward him.
“Arthur, don’t do this.”
“You involved my daughter in concealed reproductive arrangements while negotiating corporate financing with me.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“It was exactly like that.”
Camera shutters exploded around the ballroom.
Carter looked toward the press and finally understood.
His secret wasn’t being whispered in a drawing room.
It was becoming public history.
Then the ballroom doors opened.
Investigators entered with uniformed officers and representatives from the state medical board.
Carter’s face went gray.
The lead investigator approached the stage.
“Carter Sterling?”
He did not answer.
“Carter Sterling, we have warrants relating to allegations of medical fraud, conspiracy, financial misconduct, falsification of consent records, and unlawful reproductive practices.”
Carter stumbled backward.
“Where is my wife?”
The investigator stared at him.
“Safe.”
“What does that mean?”
No answer.
Carter’s voice rose.
“Where is Scarlett?”
He grabbed Tyler by the jacket.
“Call her. Get her here.”
Tyler shoved him away.
“You did this.”
“I did this?”
“You dragged all of us into it!”
Officers separated them.
Carter turned desperately toward Selene.
She stepped away.
“Sienna?”
She looked at him as though he were a stranger.
Finally, he shouted the only question he cared about.
“What about the babies?”
The investigator paused.
“The pregnancy ended today following emergency medical treatment authorized by independent physicians.”
Carter stopped moving.
“No.”
Nobody answered.
“No.”
His knees nearly buckled.
“No, you don’t understand. Those children—”
“Were never yours to distribute like corporate assets,” Edward Hale said.
Carter stared at the giant screens bearing his own signature.
For the first time in his life, there was nobody left to obey him.
