The Daily Injection

An argument woke me. Adrian's side of the bed was cold, and the clock read 2:17 a.m. He had slipped out at the same time every night that week. I followed the voices down the hall, stepping along the runner to keep my feet quiet. They came through the closed oak door of his study. Adrian spoke first, too low for me to catch the words. Dr. Evans, our private physician, answered him loudly enough. “The dose is too high, Adrian. Her platelet count is dangerously low. If we continue, you'll lose the fetus!” I put my ear against the door. Adrian answered in the same tone he used when discussing a bad quarter at the office. “If this baby is lost, we can have another,” he said. “But Lily can’t wait.” I covered my mouth and backed onto the marble. Lily was Chloe's daughter. Adrian had just put a price on our baby and decided Lily mattered more. Six months of details lined up at once: the daily “Swiss prenatal vitamins,” the weekly blood draws, the ache in my bones, the exhaustion he kept calling normal. The drug in those syringes was G-CSF, a hematopoietic stem cell mobilizer. It forced bone marrow to produce stem cells and release them into the bloodstream. I had taught residents what it did. I had explained the risks on lecture slides. At home, I had accepted Adrian's label on the vial and let him inject me. Adrian had turned me into a blood bank for Chloe's daughter. I went back to bed and pulled the silk sheets over me, though my legs would not stop shaking. Both hands settled on my stomach. Five months. There should have been a kick or a shift beneath my palm. I waited. Nothing moved. The last movement I could remember had been two days ago. I had called Adrian about it. He told me the baby was having a quiet phase and that I worried too much. I pressed my fist to my mouth. Our son might already be dead, and the man responsible was twenty feet away discussing the next dose. The bedroom door opened. I closed my eyes and kept my breathing even. Adrian's cologne reached me before the mattress dipped. He sat beside me and laid a hand on my stomach. “Our little champion is sleeping soundly,” he murmured. His voice had returned to the warm register he used with me. He kissed my temple. “Everything I do is for this family, Serena. For you and our baby.” I kept my face slack against the pillow while he stroked the stomach he had been draining for months. He fell asleep within minutes. At dawn, I opened my old research briefcase and took out the burner phone hidden under a stack of conference notes. Calling the police with a story and no records would give Adrian time to bury everything. He was Adrian Beaumont: wealthy, charming, and surrounded by people paid to protect him. I would be the frightened pregnant wife making accusations about a syringe. I needed an ultrasound, pathology, and samples that his money could not erase. The clinic I chose was in the next city. It took cash, used no shared medical system, and asked very few questions. “I need an appointment today,” I said. “A full obstetric ultrasound and a pathology report. And I need you to be very, very quiet about it.”