The pregnancy had been a quiet miracle in the eye of the storm — a tiny, fierce fact that made every risk I took feel less like reckless theater and more like a ledger with lives in the margins. I’d felt the baby shift beneath my ribs like a small, stubborn note; Dominic called it the sound of our future clearing its throat.
We’d thought we knew what our life looked like now: subpoenas, press scrums, late-night strategy, a cautious hope that truth could be pried from men with pockets and ties. Then one grayscale ultrasound changed the geometry of everything.
“There’s two,” the technician said, voice clinical and almost embarrassed by the wonder. Her smile was soft, like she’d been asked to do something private in public. The screen showed the flicker of not one but two heartbeats, quick
