Chapter 8 The Extraction #2
Elena stayed, brought Vesper food, and sat with her. She talked about the cruise, Boston, Vesper's apartment, and her life before Maine.
Vesper listened, ate, and kept her face neutral. Inside, she calculated.
The clinic was small and private, with twelve rooms. Two nurses worked the day shift, one at night. A doctor came twice a day. Security was a single, old, slow guard at the front desk watching a small TV.
The psychiatric hold meant she could not leave through the front door. Not legally, not without a doctor's release. The doctor worked for the clinic, and the clinic took orders from Elena.
But windows opened.
On the second day, Vesper asked for a shower. The nurse escorted her to a small bathroom down the hall. A window above the shower was locked with a simple latch. The scissors in her room could pick it.
She noted the window size. The window was not big, but she was small enough to fit through it. Five-four, 130 pounds with the baby. She could fit.
She returned to her room. She ate the lunch Elena brought. Vesper smiled, nodded, and played the compliant patient.
Elena left at six. She kissed Vesper's forehead. "I'll be back in the morning. Get some rest."
Vesper waited one hour, then two. The night nurse came at eight. She checked Vesper's vitals and gave her a pill.
"What is it?" Vesper asked.
"Vitamin. Your mother requested it."
Vesper took the pill. She pretended to swallow, then spit it into her hand when the nurse left. She put it under her pillow. Vesper no longer trusted anything from her mother.
At ten, the hallway grew quiet. The nurse's station was at the far end. The security guard was at the front desk, two floors down.
Vesper rose. She dressed in the clothes Elena had brought—her own jeans, a loose shirt, and shoes. Vesper checked them when Elena left. No phone, no money, no ID. Elena had taken everything.
She took scissors from the drawer. She went to the bathroom and locked the door. Vesper stood on the toilet. She worked the latch with the scissors until it popped. The window slid open.
Cold air rushed in. It was November in Boston. She was five months pregnant, climbing out of a window in November.
The drop was eight feet. She hung from the sill, then let go. Vesper landed on concrete. Her ankles screamed, and her stomach lurched. She pressed her hand against the wall and breathed.
In the parking lot, she moved through the shadows, past cars, past the security guard's window. He watched TV and did not see her.
On the street, she walked fast. Her heart pounded. Her breath was visible in the cold. She did not know where she was. Boston. Some neighborhood. She needed a phone, a cab, and help.
She saw a gas station two blocks away. It was lit and open. She walked. Her legs ached; her back throbbed. The baby kicked hard. She pressed her hand against her stomach.
"I know," she whispered. "I know. We're getting out."
The gas station had a payphone. She had not seen one in years. She picked it up. No dial tone. It needed coins, and she had none.
The attendant, a kid of about twenty, stood behind the counter. He looked up when she walked in.
"Are you okay, Miss?"
"I need to make a phone call. I don't have money. Can I..."
He looked at her: pregnant, barely dressed for the weather, shaking, scared.
"Here." He handed her his phone. "Call whoever you need."
She dialed Cillian. It rang once. He answered.
"Vesper." His voice was wrecked, raw, like he'd not slept in days. "Where are you? Are you okay? The baby. Are you..."
"I'm in Boston. I escaped a gas station. I don't know where. Cillian, my mother. She drugged me. She put me in a clinic. She lied. She told them I was suicidal."
"I know. Karen told me. I've been looking for you. I've been calling every clinic in Boston. Vesper, where are you? What do you see?"
She looked through the window. "A street. A gas station. A sign. Washington Street. I think I'm in Brighton."
"Stay there. Don't move. I'm coming. Twenty minutes."
"Twenty minutes."
"I'm coming. Don't move."
She hung up and handed back the phone. "Thank you."
The kid nodded. "Want me to call someone? The police?"
"No. He's coming. Twenty minutes."
She waited outside in the cold. Her body shook, and her stomach cramped. She ignored the stress, cold, and fear, believing it would pass.
The cramping worsened.
She pressed a hand to her stomach. The baby moved too much, frantically. Kicks were sharp, fast, and wrong.
A low, deep pain. Not a kick, but a contraction.
She bent, gripping the gas station wall. The pain rose, peaked, and broke like a wave. She gasped.
Another contraction came, closer and harder.
No. No. No. Five months. Too early. The baby was too small, too young.
"Cillian," she whispered. "Hurry."
The black SUV pulled up. She saw it through the pain. Cillian jumped out and ran to her. His face was pale, scared. He looked more scared than she'd ever seen him before.
"Vesper. What's wrong? What's happening?"
"The baby. Something's wrong. Contractions started. I think I'm in labor."
His face went white. "How long?"
"Ten minutes. Maybe less. They're close. Cillian, it's too early. Five months. The baby can't..."
He lifted her, carried her to the SUV, and laid her in the back seat. His hands were steady. The soldier is back in control.
"Don't think about that. Focus on me. Look at me."
She looked at him. His green eyes were fierce, terrified.
"I will take care of you. Both of you. I promise."
He drove fast through Boston traffic, phone in one hand, steering with the other.
"Karen. I need Dr. Marsh. No, better. I need Thorne Biotech's private medical facility. Yes. I know it's not a hospital. It's better than a hospital. Get Dr. Marsh there. Get the team there. Vesper is in labor. Five months. I need the neonatal team. Now."
He hung up and looked at her in the rearview mirror. "Twenty minutes. Hold on. Twenty minutes."
Another contraction. She screamed. The pain was blinding, full-body, and tearing.
"I'm losing the baby," she gasped.
"You are not losing anything. Hold on. Hold on."
The SUV sped through Boston. Cillian drove like a man possessed. She gripped the door handle, the seat, anything. The pain came in waves, each one worse.
"Cillian. I'm scared."
"I know. I'm here. I'm not leaving you."
"The baby."
"The baby is strong. Like you. Hold on."
She held on. To the door. To the seat. To him. To the baby. To everything.
The Thorne Biotech facility was outside Boston, twenty minutes from the gas station. Cillian drove there in fifteen.
The modern building of glass and steel was private and secure. A medical team, including Dr. Marsh, waited at the entrance. She had flown from Portland and hired a car.
They took Vesper, placed her on a gurney, and wheeled her inside. Cillian stayed beside her, his hand in hers, his face white.
Dr. Marsh examined Vesper. She worked fast and efficiently. The ultrasound showed the fetal heart rate on the monitor.
"The contractions are real," Dr. Marsh said. "It's preterm labor at twenty-two weeks. We need to stop it."
"Can you stop it?" Cillian asked.
"We can try. We'll use medication, magnesium sulfate, and bed rest. If we stop the contractions, we buy time. Every day matters at this gestation."
"And if you can't stop them?" Cillian asked.
Dr. Marsh looked at him, then at Vesper. "If the baby comes now, we face extreme prematurity. The survival rate at twenty-two weeks is low, but not zero. This facility has the best neonatal equipment in the country. Eleanor Thorne built it for exactly this situation."
Eleanor. The dead woman's hand reached from the grave again.
"Do everything," Cillian said. "Everything."
Nurses gave Vesper magnesium and put her on a monitor. The contractions slowed but did not stop. The baby's heart rate held strong and steady.
Hours passed. Vesper drifted in and out of sleep. The medication made her groggy, and pain came and went. Cillian stayed, holding her hand and speaking in her ear.
"I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. The baby's heartbeat is strong. Dr. Marsh says the contractions are slowing. We'll be okay."
She slept, woke, and slept again. Each time she woke, he was there. His face, his hand, his voice.
On the second day, the contractions stopped.
Dr. Marsh examined her. "The labor has stopped. The cervix is closed. The baby is stable. The heart rate is normal. You are out of immediate danger."
"Out of immediate danger," Vesper repeated. "What does that mean?"
"It means you are on bed rest for the rest of the pregnancy. No stress, no exertion, and no leaving this facility. We'll monitor you around the clock. The goal is to reach at least thirty-four weeks. The longer the baby stays, the better the outcome."
"Thirty-four weeks. That's three more months."
"Three more months here, in this facility, under observation."
Vesper looked at Cillian. He nodded. "We stay. However long it takes."
She looked at Dr. Marsh. "Is the baby okay?"
"The baby is a fighter. The heart rate has been strong through the whole ordeal. Regarding the genetic marker, Thorne Variant 7, I have been reading the research. Babies with this marker show increased resilience in utero. Your child is fighting."
"Our child," Cillian said.
Dr. Marsh smiled. "Your child. Yes."
She left them alone. The room was quiet. Medical equipment hummed. The fetal monitor beeped a steady rhythm, their baby's heartbeat.
Cillian sat beside the bed. He placed his hand on her stomach, his eyes wet.
"I thought I lost you," he said. "When I came back to the cottage, and you were gone, I thought I had lost both of you."
"My mother took me."
"I know. I've been dealing with it."
"Dealing with it how?"
He pulled out his phone and showed her the screen. Security footage from the cottage, their bedroom, the night she was taken.
The footage showed Elena entering through the back door with a key. She walked to the bedroom with a man, not Richard, but a driver. The man carried a medical bag.