“So then, Ms. Mitchell—can you explain how we came to find a lock of Jenna’s hair in the trunk of your car, with trace amounts of her blood on it?” Harris placed another photo in front of me—this one showed a lock of pale blonde hair dotted with a few drops of crimson red blood, lying next to a ruler.
The room started spinning. “What?” It was barely a whisper; there wasn’t enough breath in my body to speak any louder.
“We impounded your car from the parking garage below your office building. A search came up with this lock of hair, in the trunk. Care to explain? You know, it’s better if you tell the truth voluntarily.”
“That can’t be,” I whispered shakily, my breathing shallow and ragged. “Jenna’s never even been in my car. I don’t drive it that often, I walk most places.”
Roth leaned toward me, his hands on the table. “Here’s what I think, Ms. Mitchell. I think you want Max Hunter all to yourself. I think you imagine the two of you and your baby being a happy little family, but there are two women in your way: Madison Hunter and Jenna Martin. You flew into a rage and attacked Madison at her baby shower, and now you’ve done something to Jenna Martin too.”
“What? No … I told you, I don’t want Max. And why would Jenna be in my way?”
“Because Max and Jenna were together before he met you. Max was the father of Jenna’s baby.”
It was then that I noticed something on Jenna’s ankle in the full-body photo—a tattoo. I peered at it closely and realized it was a heart with the initials H.M. inside. The pieces clicked. Harold Martin, her father.
I remembered where I’d seen that tattoo before.
Jenna was my other stalker.
CHAPTER24
I’LL NEVER FORGETthe look on Max Hunter’s face when I told him our baby was dead.
His face scrunched up into a frown when he let himself into my apartment and saw me curled up in a ball under a blanket on the couch, crumpled tissues clenched in my fists and discarded all around me on the coffee table and floor. He bent over me and put his hand on my arm. He asked me what was wrong.
When I told him, his frown disappeared, leaving a blank expression in its wake. He stared at me, as if he hadn’t heard a word I’d said. So I repeated myself. “Our baby … it’s gone. It died. I lost the baby, Max.” When he still didn’t react, I persisted. “Max, did you hear me?”
Finally, he took a deep breath. “What did you say?”
Fresh tears spilled down my face. “I’m sorry … I lost our baby.” Then I was sobbing again, burying my face in my blanket as my body convulsed.
Two deaths. Now I had two deaths to mourn.
My father died about six months before I met Max. The pain was still incredibly raw, like a red-hot sunburn—easy to forget about for a few moments, until you move or twist acertain way, and a lick of fiery pain would rip through your skin, catching you by surprise.
Max seemed to fly through the various stages of grief at lightning speed. First was denial. “No. No, that can’t be right. We just saw the doctor a few weeks ago and she said everything was fine. She said the baby looked great. There must be some mistake.”
But it was no mistake. I told him the night before I had started to feel some cramping, but I’d brushed it off. Surely it was normal. My body was expanding, making room for the baby. I just needed some rest. But in the middle of the night, the pain woke me up, coming on worse than before.
The sun was rising as I noticed the first signs of blood, sitting on the toilet, clutching my abdomen. Then more, later, in my underwear. I’d finally called my doctor’s office, and she’d told me to come in as soon as possible.
By the time I got to the clinic, my obstetrician confirmed the thought that had been creeping up the back of my spine all night, finally tiptoeing inside my brain, carving out a space for itself, making itself comfortable, like a cat curling up on the furniture no matter how many times you shooed it away.
My baby was dead.
His next stage was anger.
“No. Why would she tell us everything looked great if it wasn’t great?” he said, his voice getting louder.
I told him what the doctor said—sometimes these things just happen. Everything looks good for a few weeks, and then, the baby just dies. It was an unviable egg, an unstable pregnancy. It doesn’t mean I don’t have plenty of other strong, viable eggs in me. Most likely I can get pregnant again and still have a healthy baby girl or boy—just not this time.
He quickly moved into acceptance and sadness. His eyes got shiny, and the first tears fell. He sat down next to me and buried his face in his hands.
He cried next to me on the couch. For a few blissful moments he pulled my head into his lap and cradled it, brushing my hair away from my eyes and out of the path of my tears. He squeezed my hand in his and even kissed it once. We mourned together. For a little while, I thought I had someone to grieve with, rather than grieving alone.
But it didn’t last long. After a while, he sniffed, wiped away the wet tears with the back of his fist, and stood up. “I’ve gotta go. I’m sorry. I’ll talk to you later.”
My mouth fell open. “But—”
