Cradle of Lies

No Photos

Maya sat on the edge of her hospital bed, staring at her phone in Detective Chen’s hand.

“We need to see everything,” Chen said gently. “Text messages, social media, photos. Anything that might help us understand what happened.”

“I already told you, I don’t have anything.” Maya’s voice was hoarse from crying. She’d been crying for almost twelve hours straight. Since she woke up Saturday morning to an empty bassinet and a nurse’s horrified face.

“Let’s just look together, okay?” Chen sat down beside her. “Start with your photos. Did you take any pictures of Andrea after she was born?”

Maya’s hands were shaking as she took the phone back. She opened her photo gallery with trembling fingers.

The last photo was from Friday afternoon. Her own face, puffy and tired, taken in the bathroom mirror before labor got too intense. Before everything went wrong.

“I didn’t—” Maya’s voice cracked. “I meant to. I wanted to. But I was so tired after she was born, and they said I’d have time later. They said—”

She couldn’t finish. The sob came out of nowhere, doubling her over.

She’d never taken a picture of her daughter. Never captured Andrea’s face, her tiny fingers, her dark hair. All she had were memories from those brief hours before Maya fell asleep.

And now Andrea was gone.

“It’s okay,” Chen said, though her voice was tight. “What about before? During pregnancy? Did you post anything on social media about being pregnant?”

Maya scrolled back through her photos. There—six months ago. A bathroom mirror selfie showing her small bump. She’d posted it on i********: with the caption: Scared but doing this.

Another one from seven months. Eight months. Her belly growing, her face getting rounder, the fear in her eyes visible even through the forced smiles.

“I posted these,” Maya said, showing Chen. “On i********:. But I don’t have many followers. Just people from high school, mostly. Nobody here.”

Chen took the phone and scrolled through Maya’s i********:. Thirty-seven followers. The pregnancy posts had gotten maybe five likes each. A few comments from old classmates: Congrats! and You got this girl.

Nothing helpful. No one who would have known where Maya was Friday night. No one who could have taken Andrea.

“What about the father?” Chen asked. “Carlos, right? Do you have any messages from him?”

Maya’s chest tightened. She navigated to her text messages and pulled up Carlos’s name. The last message was from six months ago.

I told you I don’t want anything to do with it. Stop texting me.

Before that, a dozen messages from Maya, all unanswered or met with variations of the same response. I can’t be a dad. This isn’t my problem. Leave me alone.

“He made it very clear he didn’t want to be involved,” Maya said quietly.

“But could he have changed his mind? Could he have taken the baby?”

“No.” Maya’s voice was certain. “He didn’t want her. He told me to get an abortion. When I said I was keeping her, he blocked me on everything. I haven’t heard from him since February.”

Chen made notes. “We’ll need his full name and last known address.”

Maya provided the information mechanically. Carlos Ruiz. Twenty-two years old. Worked at an auto shop on the east side. They’d dated for three months before Maya got pregnant. He’d made it very clear he wanted nothing to do with her or the baby.

He wouldn’t have taken Andrea. Maya was certain of that.

“What about family?” Chen asked. “Your parents, siblings—anyone who might have wanted to take the baby? Even with good intentions?”

Maya shook her head. “My mom died when I was sixteen. My dad remarried and moved to Florida. We don’t talk. I have a half-brother but I’ve never met him.” She stared at her hands. “There’s no one. That’s why I moved here. Fresh start.”

“Friends from work?”

“I work at a coffee shop. I’ve only been there four months. Nobody there even knew I was pregnant until last month.”

Chen exchanged a glance with Detective Mills, who was standing by the window.

“Maya,” Mills said carefully. “We need to ask you some difficult questions. And we need you to be completely honest with us.”

Maya looked up at him, her eyes red and swollen.

“Did you give Andrea to someone? Make an arrangement with someone to take her?”

“No!”

“Are you sure? Sometimes young mothers feel overwhelmed. Sometimes they make plans they don’t remember clearly afterward—”

“I didn’t give her to anyone!” Maya’s voice broke. “Why does everyone keep asking me that? I wanted her. I want her back. Someone took her from me!”

“We’re just trying to understand—”

“There’s nothing to understand! I went to sleep and when I woke up, she was gone!” Tears streamed down Maya’s face. “The nurse took her. The blonde nurse. She said she was taking Andrea to the nursery and she never brought her back.”

Chen leaned forward. “Tell us again about this nurse. Everything you remember.”

Maya pressed her hands to her face, trying to remember through the fog of exhaustion and pain medication. “She came in late. After the other nurse left. Maybe eleven? Midnight?”

“What did she look like?”

“Blonde hair. Young, I think. Or maybe not that young? I don’t know.” Maya’s voice was desperate. “I was so tired. Everything’s blurry.”

“Was she wearing scrubs?”

“I think so? Blue scrubs maybe?” Maya tried to picture it but couldn’t. “I’m not sure. She closed the curtain before she left. For privacy, she said.”

“Did she tell you her name?”

“I don’t remember. Maybe? I don’t know.”

Maya felt like she was failing some kind of test. Like every “I don’t know” made her look more guilty, more suspicious.

“I should have stayed awake,” she whispered. “I should have made sure. But I was so tired and she said Andrea would be fine. She said they’d bring her back in a few hours for feeding.”

“You did nothing wrong,” Chen said firmly. “You’d just given birth. You were exhausted. This isn’t your fault.”

But it felt like her fault. It felt like Maya had failed the most basic job of a mother—keeping her baby safe.

“Can I see the security footage?” Maya asked suddenly. “You said you have cameras. Can I see who took her?”

Mills and Chen exchanged another look.

“We’re reviewing the footage now,” Mills said. “But Maya, the person who took Andrea knew how to avoid the cameras. We only have partial images. Nothing clear enough to identify them.”

“But you have something? You saw someone?”

“We saw a figure in the hallway around the right time. Dressed in street clothes, wearing a hood. We can’t see the face.”

A figure in a hood. Not a nurse in scrubs. Someone who knew they were being recorded. Someone who planned this.

“Then it wasn’t a nurse,” Maya said. “It was someone pretending to be a nurse.”

“That’s what we think, yes.”

Maya felt the room tilt. Someone had pretended to be a nurse. Had walked into her room, lied to her face, and taken Andrea. And Maya had just… let them.

“I should have known,” Maya whispered. “I should have asked to see her badge or questioned her or something.”

“You’d just given birth,” Chen repeated. “You had no reason to suspect—”

“But I did!” Maya looked up at her. “I felt weird about it. When she came in. Something felt off but I was too tired to think about it. I should have trusted my instincts. I should have—”

She couldn’t continue. The sobs took over, shaking her whole body.

Chen put a hand on her shoulder and waited for the crying to subside.

“Maya,” she said gently. “We’re going to find Andrea. I promise you, we’re doing everything we can.”

But Maya could hear the uncertainty in her voice. Could see it in the way Mills looked away, unable to meet her eyes.

They didn’t know if they’d find her. Babies who were taken like this—stolen from hospitals in the middle of the night—sometimes they were never found.

Sometimes they just disappeared.

“She’s one day old,” Maya said, her voice breaking. “She needs me. She needs to eat. She doesn’t know anyone else. She doesn’t—”

Maya couldn’t finish. The image of Andrea alone somewhere, crying for a mother who couldn’t come, was too much.

“We’re checking local hospitals, pediatricians, anyone who might see a newborn in the next few days,” Mills said. “And we’ve issued an Amber Alert. Andrea’s photo is going out to every phone in the state.”

“What photo?” Maya asked. “I don’t have any photos.”

Mills pulled out his phone and showed her. It was a generic image—a stock photo of a newborn, not Andrea at all.

“We had to use a substitute for now,” he explained. “But we included the details. Seven pounds eight ounces, dark hair, born Friday evening.”

A substitute photo. Because Maya didn’t have a single picture of her own daughter.

“Can I go home?” Maya asked suddenly. “I can’t stay here. I can’t be in this room anymore.”

“The doctor wants you to stay until tomorrow,” Chen said. “For observation. You just gave birth, you need to recover—”

“I can’t stay here.” Maya stood up, her legs shaky but holding. “Please. I need to go home. I need to—”

She needed to do something. Needed to search, to look, to find Andrea herself because sitting in this hospital room answering the same questions over and over wasn’t helping.

Chen stood too. “Let me talk to the doctor. See if we can get you discharged early. But Maya—you need to rest. You need to take care of yourself.”

“I need to find my daughter.”

After the detectives left, Maya sat alone in the room that had become a crime scene. The bassinet was still in the corner, empty. The receiving blanket they’d wrapped Andrea in was gone—taken as evidence, they’d said.

The only sign that Andrea had ever existed was the hospital bracelet still on Maya’s wrist. Martinez, Baby Girl. Born 9:04 PM.

Maya touched it with trembling fingers and felt the tears start again.

She’d held Andrea for maybe an hour total. One hour out of her whole life. And she’d been so scared, so overwhelmed, so certain she couldn’t do this.

Now she’d give anything to have that chance back.

A nurse came in—not the blonde one, a different nurse Maya recognized from her labor. She had kind eyes and moved quietly around the room.

“I’m so sorry, honey,” she said. “We’re all just devastated. Nothing like this has ever happened here before.”

Maya didn’t respond. What was there to say?

“Is there anyone I can call for you? Family, friends?”

“No. There’s no one.”

The nurse’s expression crumpled. “You shouldn’t be alone right now.”

But Maya had been alone for six months. Through the whole pregnancy. Through labor. Through everything.

Being alone was all she knew.

“I’d like to sleep,” Maya said quietly.

“Of course.” The nurse dimmed the lights and left.

But Maya didn’t sleep. She lay in the bed where she’d given birth less than twenty-four hours ago and stared at the empty bassinet.

Somewhere out there, someone had her daughter.

Someone was holding Andrea, feeding her, maybe even loving her.

And Maya had no idea how to get her back.