Chapter 2 - THE WOMAN WHO CAME BEFORE THE KNIFE
Her name was Lauren Price.
Thirty four.
Registered nurse.
Maternal fetal medicine coordinator.
I had spoken to her twice by phone.
Never at my house.
Or so I thought.
Dr. Cole checked the clinic schedule.
Lauren had entered:
HOME FOLLOW UP, PATIENT REQUESTED PRIVACY.
I had requested nothing.
“Who scheduled it?”
The hospital IT department traced the request.
It came through my patient portal.
My username.
My account.
Not me.
Rachel looked at me.
“Did Mark know your password?”
“Yes.”
I hated how quickly the answer came.
Months earlier, I gave it to him because I was tired.
Appointments.
Insurance questions.
Lab results.
He said:
“I’ll handle the boring stuff.”
I thought that was marriage.
The police detective assigned to the case introduced herself as Sarah Mills.
She listened without interrupting.
Then asked:
“Why would your husband request a private home visit from a prenatal nurse?”
“I don’t know.”
Dr. Cole did.
“There was a discrepancy in Emily’s prenatal record.”
My heart started pounding.
“What discrepancy?”
She hesitated.
“Fetal sex.”
Rachel looked between us.
Dr. Cole opened the chart.
My original blood screening at twelve weeks showed:
Male fetus.
Not female.
I stared.
“No.”
The report Mark showed me said female.
I remembered the pink header.
The little line beneath chromosome screening.
Consistent with female fetus.
Elaine cried when she saw it.
Mark opened champagne for everyone except me.
I had spent months believing I was carrying a daughter.
“The report in my portal said girl.”
Dr. Cole shook her head.
“The official laboratory result says male.”
“Then someone changed it.”
“Possibly the copy you saw.”
Detective Mills leaned forward.
“Could Lauren have discovered that?”
“Yes.”
Dr. Cole explained that Lauren reviewed my chart two days earlier after an insurance authorization question.
She noticed a scanned copy of a fetal sex disclosure form saying female.
It conflicted with the original lab interface.
She flagged it.
Then somebody using my portal requested that she discuss the issue privately at home.
Lauren left the clinic at 9:10 that morning.
Her car was recorded entering my neighborhood at 9:47.
Her phone connected briefly to a cell tower less than half a mile from my house.
Then nothing.
I looked at Rachel.
“What time did Mark come home?”
She checked my messages.
I had texted her at 10:18.
MARK CAME BACK EARLY. ELAINE’S WITH HIM. SOMETHING’S WRONG.
My stomach twisted.
Lauren may have been there before them.
Or with them.
Detective Mills asked:
“Did you see anyone?”
“No.”
I remembered the doorbell.
There had been one.
I was upstairs changing.
Elaine shouted:
“I’ll get it.”
When I came down, Elaine was in the kitchen alone.
She said a delivery driver had the wrong address.
Could have been Lauren.
Then another memory.
A broken mug beside the sink.
I asked what happened.
Elaine said she dropped it.
There had been a red smear near the drain.
I thought tomato sauce.
Detective Mills wrote everything down.
Then her phone vibrated.
Search team had found Lauren’s car.
Two miles from my house.
Unlocked.
Her purse inside.
Phone missing.
A small amount of blood on the driver’s door.
Rachel gripped my hand.
The cloth under my chair suddenly felt heavier than the evidence bag could possibly be.
Then Mills looked at me.
“Emily, did Mark use a knife from the kitchen?”
“Yes.”
“Which one?”
“Small black handle. Utility knife.”
She showed me an evidence photo.
Police had recovered it from the sink.
Washed.
No visible blood.
But the drain trap had been preserved.
And there was one more problem.
The cleaner Elaine used on me was not where first responders expected it to be.
The bottle label said household degreaser.
The liquid inside was not the original product.
Someone had poured a much stronger industrial cleaner into the bottle.
May you like
Purchased through Mark’s construction account three days earlier.
Continue to the next part: Investigators discover the cleaner was deliberately transferred into a household bottle after being purchased through Mark’s business.
