Chapter 3 - The Woman in Blue
Hospital security locked Rachel's chart within ten minutes.
That did not make her feel safer.
"We can move you to a private room," the security supervisor said. "Your name won't appear on the public room list."
"Do it," Jason said.
Rachel hated how quickly he answered for her, but this time she let him.
Mia stood near the door, staring at her phone.
"What?" Rachel asked.
Mia turned the screen around.
A photograph showed Rachel and Jason leaving Dr. Patel's office three weeks earlier.
The picture had been taken from across the parking lot.
"Where did you get that?" Jason asked.
"Mom texted it to me."
Rachel stared. "Why?"
"She asked if Rachel always wore flats to appointments. I thought she was making one of her awful comments about clothes."
Jason's face tightened. "When?"
"Three weeks ago."
Rachel remembered the day. She had felt watched in the garage, but pregnancy had made her tired, emotional, and suspicious of every shadow.
Maybe she had not been suspicious enough.
A security officer entered.
"We found the terminal used to access Mrs. Hawthorne's file. It belongs to a temporary administrative employee."
"Name?" Jason asked.
"Gwen Mercer."
Mia dropped her phone.
Jason looked at her. "You know her?"
"I saw her with Mom."
"Where?"
"At Dad's memorial fundraiser last spring. Mom introduced her as someone from a charity."
Rachel felt a slow, sick twist in her stomach.
"Get her."
The officer hesitated. "She left the building nine minutes ago."
Jason swore under his breath.
"Cameras?"
"We're checking."
Rachel's phone buzzed on the bed.
Unknown number.
She opened the message.
YOU SHOULD HAVE TAKEN THE HINT.
Beneath it was a photograph.
Rachel sleeping in her own bedroom.
The picture had been taken from inside the room.
Jason saw it over her shoulder.
"What the hell?"
Rachel's hands went numb.
Another message appeared.
PLAN A WAS KINDER.
Mia whispered, "Oh my God."
Jason called the security officer back.
"Nobody leaves this floor."
Then Rachel noticed something in the sleeping photograph.
On the nightstand beside her bed sat a vase of white orchids.
She had thrown those flowers away a month ago.
The photo was old.
And there was only one person who had been in the bedroom that night.
May you like
Rachel looked at Jason.
"Your mother wasn't alone."
