Fae wakes slowly, her mind wrapped in thick fog.
The sedative still clings to her veins, heavy and sluggish. Her eyelids flutter.
The ceiling above her is white and cracked, lit by a single fluorescent bulb that hums softly.
She blinks. Once then, twice.
Then memory crashes back like a wave of ice water.
Her baby. Kael.
She sits up so fast that her head spins. Her hands fly to her stomach—flat now, empty, hollow. The bump is gone. Her son is gone.
"No," she whispers. "No, no, no."
The door to the small waiting room opens. Maxwell enters.
His footsteps are slow, deliberate. His face is stone. His eyes are cold.
Fae's heart lurches. She reaches out toward him, her hands trembling.
"Dad?" she asks, her voice cracked and raw. "Dad, where is my baby? Where is my Kael?"
Maxwell sto
