Chapter 43: Confrontation
The reply I’d been hoping for never came. I stared at the phone screen in the dusty pantry, willing Amari’s name to appear, but there was only silence. Maybe she was asleep, maybe she’d blocked my number entirely, maybe she simply didn’t care anymore about the sister who’d abandoned her months ago.
I deleted the message thread anyway and returned the phone to its place among the preserves, my heart heavy with disappointment but still clinging to desperate hope. At least I’d tried. At least somewhere in the digital void, evidence existed of what Adrian had done to me.
I returned to our bedroom to find Adrian stirring, his internal clock apparently telling him it was time to wake and prepare for another day of perfectly orchestrated control.
“Good morning, beautiful,” he murmured, reaching for me with the casual possessiveness that had once made me feel cherished and now made my skin crawl. “You’re up early.”
“I had trouble sleeping,” I said, settling on the edge of the bed where I could see his face clearly. “Dreams.”
“Bad dreams?” His concern seemed genuine, but I caught the sharp attention behind it—the calculation of a man assessing potential problems.
“Memories,” I corrected, watching his expression carefully. “About things you told me were lost forever.”
Something shifted in Adrian’s features—so subtle most people would have missed it, but months of studying his moods had taught me to read the micro-expressions that revealed his true thoughts.
“What kind of memories?”
“About my son.”
The words hung in the air between us like an accusation. Adrian went very still, his silver eyes fixed on my face with the intensity of a predator evaluating prey.
“Calla,” he said gently, “we’ve discussed this. You lost your baby. The grief and trauma affected your memory of the events, but—”
“I had twins.” My voice was steady despite the emotions churning in my chest. “One died, but one lived. You took him from me while I was unconscious and vulnerable.”
Now I saw the real Adrian—the mask slipping just enough to reveal the cold calculation beneath. “That’s not what happened.”
“I have the medical records. I know what I signed, and I know I wasn’t competent to sign it.” I leaned forward, letting him see the fury building behind my eyes. “Where is my son, Adrian?”
“You’re having another episode,” he said, rising from the bed with fluid grace that somehow managed to be both elegant and menacing. “The stress of my business trip, the isolation—it’s triggering the paranoid delusions Dr. Hayes has been helping you manage.”
“Stop lying to me.” The words came out harder than intended, but I was past caring about maintaining the facade of the grateful, compliant wife. “I remember signing those papers. I remember you manipulating me when I was barely conscious from blood loss.”
“You remember trauma and grief distorting reality into something your mind could better handle,” Adrian said with the kind of professional calm that made him sound like he was reading from a psychology textbook. “This is exactly why you need continued treatment.”
“I’m not taking any more of your treatments,” I said, standing to face him directly. “I’m not going to let you keep me in this fog while my child grows up somewhere without his mother.”
“Calla.” Adrian’s voice dropped to that dangerously intimate register, the tone he used when he wanted to remind me of his power over me. “You’re frightening me with this behavior. These delusions, this paranoia—it’s exactly what Dr. Hayes warned might happen if your treatment was interrupted.”
“Where is Nathaniel?” I demanded, the name feeling like fire in my mouth.
Adrian’s composure cracked completely. For just a moment, I saw something raw and dangerous in his eyes—surprise that I remembered the name, calculation about how to handle this new development, and underneath it all, a possessiveness so absolute it bordered on madness.
“That name means nothing,” he said, but his voice had lost its smooth confidence.
“It means everything. He’s my son, and you stole him from me.”
“I saved him from an unstable mother who couldn’t even remember giving birth to him!”
The admission hung between us like a confession, confirming everything I’d suspected and feared. Adrian had my child. Somewhere, somehow, Nathaniel was alive and growing up without knowing I existed.
“Bring him home,” I said quietly. “Bring him home now, or I swear I’ll—”
“You’ll what?” Adrian’s smile was razor-sharp, all pretense of loving concern finally abandoned. “Call the police? They’ll take one look at your medical history, your psychiatric treatment, your obvious mental instability, and recommend immediate hospitalization.”
Before I could respond, a sharp knock interrupted the tension crackling between us.
“Come in,” Adrian called, his voice instantly transforming back to calm authority.
Thomas appeared in the doorway, his expression apologetically professional. “Mr. Thorne, I apologize for the interruption, but you have a visitor. Ms. Keats is quite insistent that she needs to speak with you immediately.”
Adrian’s jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. “Tell her to wait in my study. I’ll be there shortly.”
After Thomas left, Adrian turned back to me with the kind of predatory focus that made me want to run.
“This conversation isn’t over,” he said quietly. “But it is paused until I can arrange proper medical attention for your obvious distress.”
As he left our bedroom, I realized that my window for escape was closing rapidly. Soon, Adrian would return with whatever replacement he’d found for Dr. Hayes, and they would drug me back into compliance.
Unless help came first.