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She’s been unconscious since she arrived. We’re hopeful she’ll wake up soon, but her body has been through significant trauma.”
As we walked through the maze of hospital corridors, I forced myself to ask the question that had been burning in my throat since I saw the empty house. “Where is her husband?”
In her eyes, I saw something that made my blood turn to ice. Pity mixed with disgust. “We’ve been unable to reach Mr.
Ashford. The staff has tried calling repeatedly, but his phone appears to be disconnected or out of service range.”
David Ashford. My son-in-law of three years.
The man who’d sworn to love and protect my daughter through sickness and health. The man who charmed his way into our family with his easy smile and ambitious talk about his tech startup. “Have you checked with his office?”
“His business partner said he’s been unreachable for over a week.
Something about a business trip that got extended.”
We reached the ICU, and through the glass partition, I saw my daughter for the first time in three months. Isabella looked so small in that hospital bed, dwarfed by machines and monitors. Her usually lustrous dark hair hung limp against the pillow, and her skin had a pale, translucent quality that spoke of prolonged neglect.
But it was her belly—round and prominent beneath the hospital blanket—that broke my heart completely. My grandchild fighting for life inside a mother who’d been abandoned when she needed protection most. I sat beside Isabella’s bed and took her hand in mine.
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