“I am coming to the hospital now,” I said.

“She is asking for the boys, Daniel,” Dr. Shah said.

“She keeps repeating their names.”

“Tell her they are safe,” I said.

“Tell her I am bringing them.”

I hung up the phone and looked at Ruth.

“Where are Lucas and Owen?” I asked.

“They are asleep upstairs,” Ruth said.

“They don’t know any of this.”

“Wake them up gently, Ruth,” I said.

“We are going to the hospital.”

Ruth nodded and stood up, her knees cracking slightly in the quiet room.

“I will get their coats,” she said.

I walked out of the pantry and into the grand hallway of the estate.

The crystal chandelier cast long shadows across the marble floor.

This house had always felt too large, too empty.

Now, it felt like a museum of a life I no longer wanted to live.

I looked down at the contract in my hand.

The legal terms were written in precise black ink.

It was the agreement Vance had forced Claire to sign five years ago.

An agreement that stripped her of her rights as a mother.