Chapter 5

The hotel room was clean, quiet, and paid for by a man she did not trust.

Dorcas sat on the edge of the bed with the contract in her lap and her phone in her hand.

She had watched the video three times.

Isaiah looked wonderful. That was the worst part. Clean shirt, soft light, red-rimmed

eyes. “Dorcas was kind enough to carry our son,” he said to the camera. “But since the

birth she has been unwell. What happened at the hospital was a breakdown. I only want

to protect my child.”

He paused to wipe his eye. It was an excellent performance. She had once loved that

face.

Eleven thousand views. The comments scrolled past. Poor man. Some women shouldn’t

be allowed near babies. Hope she gets help. One comment had two thousand likes: She

sold her own baby. What kind of monster.

She turned the phone face down.

She had called three lawyers that evening. Each call began the same way: My name is

Dorcas Starling, and I intend to fight a surrogacy waiver I never signed. Two hung up

the moment they heard Isaiah’s name. By the second call she suspected the news had

travelled faster than she had. The third asked for a retainer she did not have, and then,

oddly, whether she had told anyone else she planned to fight. She had said no. He had

sounded relieved.

She compared her real signature on the contract with the photograph of the forged one.

The differences were small. The loop on her D was closed. Hers never was.

She did not trust Desmond Allen. But she could use him.She read the contract the way she read everything: slowly, with a pencil, looking for

what wasn’t said. Nine pages. Clean language. No mention of love, which she

appreciated. At clause fourteen she stopped.

If either party ends this Agreement, all obligations of the Allen side cease immediately.

If he got what he needed and walked away, her fight for her son would be left half

finished, with no money behind it.

It was two in the morning. She dialled the number on his card anyway.

He answered on the first ring.

“You don’t sleep?”

“Not this week.” His voice was low and flat. “I was reading about Isaiah’s investors. You

read it.”

“Clause fourteen. If you end this, your lawyers vanish.”

“That’s standard.”

“Then I’m adding a line. The legal fight over my son is funded no matter what. Even if

this ends. Even if you end it.”

“Done,” Desmond said.

“Just like that?”

“I would have offered it if you hadn’t asked.” A pause. “Miss Starling. Most people would

have asked for money.”

“I know,” she said, and hung up before she could make the mistake of thanking him.

* * *

At nine, in a glass office on the top floor of Allen Corporation, Desmond opened a desk

drawer, took out a small black box and slid it across to her the way a man might pass a

stapler.He glanced at the bruise on her cheek. “There’s makeup in the car.”

“I’d rather they see it.”

“Wear it. Don’t lose it.”

It was a plain gold band. It fit.

The amended page was waiting. She checked every word of the new clause. Then she

signed.

Her signature came out steady. Every loop hers. It was the first thing she had signed in

months where she knew exactly what it said.

* * *

The burial was the next afternoon.

She stood beside him in a borrowed black dress that did not quite hide the bruise on her

cheek, and she felt the eyes arrive one by one. A thin man with silver hair: Mr Chen. A

younger man with a pleasant smile: Dominic. A woman in pearls, another with sharp

eyes, a stooped man at the end of the row. They stood in a line like a jury.

“Desmond.” The woman in pearls did not lower her voice. “Who is she?”

“My fiancée,” Desmond said.

“You don’t have a fiancée.”

“I will have a wife by tonight.”

Dominic’s smile slipped, just slightly, and put itself back. A stooped man at the end of

the row muttered, “Hardly the bride I expected.” Nobody corrected him.

When the coffin was lowered, a muscle jumped in Desmond’s jaw and his hand twitched

at his side. She did not take it. It was not in the contract.

* * *The registry office had fluorescent lights and a numbered ticket machine. A registrar

with a cold read from a form without lifting her head. David and a yawning clerk stood

as witnesses.

“Do we say anything?” Dorcas asked.

“Not unless you want to,” the registrar said.

“We don’t,” said Desmond. Then, quietly, to her: “You can still walk out.”

“Can I?” she said.

There were no vows. There was no kiss. There was a space on a page for her name, and a

space for his, and a stamp. Desmond signed without reading. Dorcas read hers twice.

“Congratulations,” the registrar said to her desk.

Outside, on the steps, the wind pulled at her borrowed dress. She was Mrs Allen. She

had been Mrs Allen for four minutes, and it felt like wearing someone else’s coat.

“The car’s this way,” Desmond said.

Her phone buzzed in her bag.

She saw a number she did not know, and a photograph.

Her son. Asleep in a white blanket, one tiny fist curled against Emily’s collar. Emily was

smiling at the camera.

Under it, three words.

Say goodbye.

Desmond leaned over her shoulder and went very still.

“Don’t answer that.”

“I already know what I’m going to say.” She had told three lawyers she meant to fight,

and one of them had wanted very badly to know who else knew. She could not prove it.

But someone had made a call.Her thumbs did not shake. She typed one word and sent it.

No.

The message turned to read at once.

Somebody had been waiting for her answer.