Chapter 4: The Blue Box
The room filled with nurses.
Dad was forced into the hallway as Dr. Walsh ordered medication and repositioned me.
The baby’s heartbeat had slowed because my blood pressure had suddenly crashed.
For several terrifying minutes, I believed Ryan had succeeded even from inside a police station.
“Stay with me,” Dr. Walsh said. “Breathe slowly.”
The monitor crackled.
Then the heartbeat returned.
Weak at first.
Then stronger.
Dr. Walsh kept me under continuous observation.
“You and the baby are stable,” she said, “but the trauma has placed you at high risk for early labor. You cannot return to that apartment.”
“I won’t.”
Saying it felt strange.
For months, leaving Ryan had seemed impossible.
Now returning to him seemed unimaginable.
Detective Torres returned that afternoon.
The police had located the blue box.
Dr. Hale had left it inside a locker at Chicago Union Station.
Security footage showed him purchasing a ticket to Milwaukee, but he never boarded the train.
Inside the box were medical records, forged psychiatric evaluations, and copies of documents carrying my signature.
Most of the signatures looked real because they were real.
Ryan had placed papers in front of me while I was drugged, telling me they were insurance forms or hospital documents.
One was a petition granting him temporary medical authority if I became incapacitated.
Another nominated Linda as the baby’s guardian if both Ryan and I were unable to provide care.
But the final document was the worst.
A two-million-dollar life insurance policy had been opened in my name eight months earlier.
Ryan was the sole beneficiary.
Dad stared at the amount.
“Two million?”
Detective Torres placed a financial report beside it.
“Ryan owes nearly seven hundred thousand dollars.”
“For what?”
“Sports betting, private loans, and several failed investments.”
I looked toward the window.
Ryan often came home angry after watching games.
He told me his company was under pressure.
He never said the pressure came from men demanding money.
“There’s more,” Detective Torres said.
The policy included an additional payout if my death resulted from an accident.
A fall down the stairs would have looked like an accident.
Especially if my blood contained sedatives and my records described me as unstable.
“What about the baby?” I whispered.
“If the baby survived, Ryan would still be the father and legal guardian.”
Dad stood abruptly.
“He was going to kill her, take the money, and keep the child?”
“That appears to have been the plan.”
I shook my head.
“No.”
Everyone turned toward me.
“Ryan didn’t want the baby.”
“How do you know?” Torres asked.
“He told Linda the baby wasn’t his.”
Dad’s expression changed.
“Is that true?”
“No. Ryan is the only possible father.”
Ryan had accused me of cheating after I became pregnant.
At first, I thought it was jealousy.
Later, I realized it was strategy.
He convinced Linda that I had humiliated their family. Linda began calling the baby a parasite and demanding that I confess.
“She believed him,” I said.
Dad looked at the guardianship papers.
“If Linda believed the child wasn’t Ryan’s, why would she agree to become guardian?”
“I don’t know.”
Detective Torres turned to the documents again.
“The answer may be in the missing pages.”
Several sections had been removed from the box.
Only the burned edges remained.
That evening, police searched the trash compactor beneath the apartment building.
Among the ashes, they found fragments of my journal.
They also found part of a handwritten letter.
May you like
Only one sentence remained readable.
Linda must never discover what Ryan plans to do after Emily dies.
