Cradle of Lies

After The Interview

Dorothy stood with her back against the door, listening as the detectives’ footsteps faded down the hallway. The elevator dinged. Silence.

They were gone.

She’d done it. She’d looked them in the eye and lied about Friday night, and they’d believed her. They’d seen her enormous pregnant belly and never questioned it. Had helped her to her feet like she was fragile.

Detective Chen had even wished her luck with the delivery.

Dorothy pressed her hands to the padding and felt her heart hammering underneath. Saturday afternoon. The police had just been here. Jake was still at the lake and wouldn’t be home until Tuesday.

Three more days of being alone with Kylee.

From the bedroom, a soft cry started.

Dorothy pushed off the door and moved quickly down the hall. Kylee was awake in her bassinet, her tiny face scrunching up. Dorothy scooped her up before the cry could get louder, even though there was no one left to hear.

“Shh,” Dorothy whispered, rocking her gently. “It’s okay. Mama’s here.”

Kylee was barely a day old. Less than twenty-four hours since Dorothy had carried her out of St. Catherine’s and brought her home. Still so tiny. Still learning how to exist outside the womb. She rooted against Dorothy’s shoulder, hungry again.

Dorothy carried her to the kitchen and prepared a bottle with one hand, Kylee balanced against her chest. She’d gotten better at this already—the one-handed bottle prep, the way to hold a newborn while doing everything else.

She’d been practicing for nine months, after all. Watching new mothers at the hospital, studying how they moved, what they did.

Though none of her practice had been with an actual baby.

Kylee latched onto the bottle immediately, her eyes closing as she drank. Dorothy sat on the couch and stared down at her. Dark hair. Brown eyes when they were open. Seven pounds, eight ounces.

Perfect.

Not hers.

Dorothy pushed the thought away. Kylee was hers now. She’d taken her. She’d brought her home. She’d fed her and changed her and held her through the night.

She was Kylee’s mother now. Not Maya Martinez.

Maya, who was probably still at the hospital, probably still being questioned by police. Maya, who’d woken up Saturday morning to find her baby gone.

Dorothy’s stomach twisted. She took a breath and focused on Kylee’s face. On the way her little hand curled against the bottle. On the soft sounds she made while eating.

This was right. Maya didn’t want this baby. She’d said it over and over during labor—“I can’t do this. I’m not ready. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Dorothy was giving Kylee a better life. A home with two parents who wanted her. A nursery full of supplies. Everything a baby needed.

Maya couldn’t have given her that.

Dorothy told herself this as she burped Kylee. Told herself this as she changed her diaper. Told herself this as she put her back down in the bassinet and watched her fall asleep.

She was doing the right thing.

The TV was still on from earlier, volume low. Dorothy picked up the remote and changed to a news channel. Saturday afternoon coverage. Local news.

“—still searching for the newborn who disappeared from St. Catherine’s Medical Center Friday night. Baby Andrea Martinez was taken from her mother’s hospital room sometime between eleven PM and midnight. Police say they’re reviewing security footage and interviewing hospital staff.”

Dorothy’s hand tightened on the remote.

The screen showed the outside of St. Catherine’s. Then a photo—Maya’s face, younger-looking than in person, pulled from what looked like a social media account.

“Nineteen-year-old Maya Martinez gave birth to her daughter Friday evening. When she woke Saturday morning, the baby was gone. Police are asking anyone with information to come forward.”

A phone number appeared on the screen. A tip line.

Dorothy turned off the TV and sat in the sudden silence. Her reflection stared back at her from the black screen—exhausted, still wearing the padding under her loose shirt, looking every bit the expectant mother.

But she wasn’t expecting anymore. The baby was here. In the next room, sleeping.

She should feel relief. Should feel joy. She’d done it—pulled off the impossible. Maintained a nine-month lie and found a way to end it that kept Jake, kept her life together.

Instead, she felt hollow.

Dorothy walked to the bedroom and looked at Kylee sleeping. So peaceful. So unaware of everything that had happened. Of being carried out of a hospital in the middle of the night. Of being stolen from her mother. Of becoming someone else’s daughter.

She needed to call Jake. Needed to tell him the baby had come early. But she had to time it right.

Tomorrow. She’d call him tomorrow when she knew he’d be out on the lake without cell service. Leave a voicemail saying she’d gone into labor Saturday night, delivered Sunday morning. By the time he got the message and raced home Tuesday, enough time would have passed that the timeline would seem believable.

Sunday morning. That’s when Kylee would officially be “born.”

Dorothy pulled out her phone and opened a new text to Lisa: Contractions started last night. At hospital now. Will update soon.

She didn’t send it yet. Tomorrow morning. She’d send it tomorrow morning and then turn off her phone, make it seem like she was busy with labor and delivery.

By the time anyone could ask questions, she’d have her story straight.

The story was simple: Labor started Saturday night around eleven PM. She’d driven herself to Mercy General—the hospital where she’d claimed to be getting prenatal care all along. Delivered Sunday morning at 3:47 AM. Everything went perfectly. Healthy baby girl, seven pounds eight ounces.

She had the hospital bracelet she’d taken from St. Catherine’s supply closet months ago, already filled out with Mercy General’s information. Had the receiving blanket, the tiny hat, the diaper—all standard issue that could have come from any hospital.

No one would question it. Women delivered at Mercy General every day. And Dorothy had nine months of fake ultrasounds showing prenatal care there. Had told everyone—Jake, her mother, Patricia, coworkers—that’s where she’d be giving birth.

The timeline would work too. Jake left Friday morning. Baby came Saturday night while he was unreachable. He’d get the message Sunday, rush home Monday or Tuesday. By then, “Kylee” would be two or three days old. Everything would seem normal.

It would work.

It had to work.

Dorothy set her phone down and walked to the nursery. The room she and Jake had spent months preparing. The pale yellow walls. The white crib with its carefully arranged bedding. The changing table stocked with diapers and wipes. The rocking chair where she’d imagined feeding her baby.

Except she’d never imagined it would be like this.

She’d never imagined she’d be a kidnapper.

Dorothy sank into the rocking chair and put her face in her hands. What had she done? What had she actually done?

She’d stolen a baby. Had walked into a hospital room in the middle of the night, taken a newborn from beside her sleeping mother, and carried her out like she had every right to.

She’d seen Maya’s face. Had heard her terror during labor, her desperation. Had held her hand and coached her through delivery and watched her hold Andrea for the first time.

And then she’d taken that baby away.

A sob built in Dorothy’s chest. She pressed her hand over her mouth to keep it silent.

From the bedroom, Kylee started crying again.

Dorothy stood up immediately, wiping her eyes. She couldn’t fall apart. Not now. Not when she still had three days to hold everything together before Jake came home.

She went to Kylee and picked her up, checked her diaper, rocked her until she settled. The routine was already becoming familiar. Feed, burp, change, rock, sleep. Feed, burp, change, rock, sleep.

This was her life now. This was what she’d done to keep Jake from leaving.

Was it worth it?

Dorothy looked down at Kylee’s face. At her tiny features, her perfect little nose, her rosebud mouth. She was beautiful. Innocent. Deserving of so much more than this.

“I’m sorry,” Dorothy whispered. “I’m so sorry.”

But sorry didn’t change anything. Sorry didn’t give Andrea back to Maya. Sorry didn’t undo what Dorothy had done.

Dorothy carried Kylee back to the living room and sat on the couch, the baby cradled against her chest. She turned the TV back on, volume barely audible, and flipped through channels until she found more news coverage.

“—mother is devastated,” a reporter was saying, standing outside St. Catherine’s. “Nineteen-year-old Maya Martinez gave birth to her daughter Andrea Friday evening. According to hospital staff, Maya was alone during the delivery. The baby’s father is not involved, and Maya has no family in the area.”

The screen showed a brief clip of someone being escorted out of the hospital—Dorothy couldn’t see the face, but the hunched shoulders and the way the person was holding themselves suggested complete devastation.

Was that Maya? Being taken home to an empty apartment, to a life without her daughter?

Dorothy changed the channel.

She spent the rest of Saturday in a fog of feeding and changing and rocking. Every time Kylee cried, Dorothy’s anxiety spiked—irrational fear that someone would hear, that the neighbors would call the police, that someone would know.

But no one came. The apartment stayed quiet except for Kylee’s small sounds. Dorothy moved from room to room like a ghost, caring for a baby who wasn’t hers, wearing a fake pregnant belly even though the pregnancy was supposedly over, living inside a lie that was growing bigger by the hour.

By six PM, her phone buzzed. A text from Patricia: How are you feeling? Any contractions yet? So excited to meet our grandbaby!

Dorothy stared at the message. She’d have to respond eventually. But not yet. Tomorrow, when she “went into labor,” she could say she’d been too busy to reply.

Another text came through, this time from her mother: Haven’t heard from you in a few days. Everything okay? Call me.

Dorothy set the phone down without responding.

By evening, she was exhausted. She’d barely slept since Friday night. The adrenaline that had carried her through stealing Kylee, bringing her home, hiding her from the police—it was all wearing off now, leaving her hollow and shaking.

She made herself eat something—crackers and cheese that tasted like cardboard. Checked on Kylee for the hundredth time. Stared at her phone, at all the messages she’d have to answer, all the people she’d have to lie to.

Tomorrow. She’d deal with it tomorrow.

Dorothy gave Kylee her eight PM bottle and changed her diaper. Put her down in the bassinet beside the bed. Stood there watching her sleep, this tiny person who had no idea what had been done to her, what her life had become in less than twenty-four hours.

“I’ll take care of you,” Dorothy whispered. “I promise. I’ll be a good mother.”

But even as she said it, she knew it was a lie. Good mothers didn’t steal other people’s babies. Good mothers didn’t rip newborns away from their birth mothers in the middle of the night.

Good mothers told the truth.

Dorothy climbed into bed—still wearing the pregnancy padding because she couldn’t risk taking it off, couldn’t risk being seen without it even in her own home. What if a neighbor knocked? What if someone came to the door unexpectedly? She had to maintain the illusion until she could stage the “birth.”

In the dark, Dorothy stared at the ceiling and thought about Maya Martinez. About whether she was still at the hospital or if they’d let her go home. About what she was feeling right now—the grief, the terror, the desperate need to find her baby.

About whether she blamed herself. Whether she was replaying every moment of Friday night, wondering what she could have done differently, how she could have protected Andrea better.

Dorothy closed her eyes against the image but it wouldn’t leave. Maya’s face. Maya’s hands reaching for a baby who wasn’t there. Maya’s voice crying out for Andrea.

Kylee made a small sound in her sleep, and Dorothy’s eyes snapped open. She rolled onto her side to look at the bassinet, at the tiny bundle barely visible in the dim light from the hallway.

In three days, Jake would come home to meet his daughter. In three days, this would all become real and permanent and irreversible.

Three more days to hold everything together.

Three more days to make everyone believe the lie.

Three more days before she could never, ever take it back.

Dorothy rolled onto her side and watched Kylee sleep, her tiny chest rising and falling in the dim light from the hallway.

“It’s going to be okay,” Dorothy whispered. “You’re safe now. You’re home.”

And she almost believed it.