Chapter 3

The helicopter lifted without Olivia.

Weight restrictions allowed only medical staff. Olivia stood beneath the terrace lights in her ruined wedding dress, one hand on the medic’s headset. As the mountain dropped away, she became a white shape beside the dark stain on the stones.

Daniel’s place beside me remained empty.

At the hospital, the fetal monitor found Sophie’s heartbeat and then lost it. Nurses cut away my pale blue dress while a doctor pressed an ultrasound probe into my abdomen. The dress fell in blood-heavy folds—the dress Daniel had zipped for me two hours earlier.

“Your placenta is separating,” the doctor said. “The baby’s heart rate is dropping. We need to perform a cesarean now.”

“Will she live?”

“This is her best chance, and yours.”

The consent form trembled against the clipboard. My signature began with a recognizable C and collapsed into a line when another spasm seized me. No one asked for my husband’s permission. They asked whether I understood, and I said yes because Sophie could not wait for me to be less afraid.

A nurse removed my wedding ring and sealed it in a clear belongings bag with my torn dress strap and phone. The gold band slid into one corner, absurdly bright and intact.

The hospital called Daniel twice. Olivia called him from the road. Neither call was answered.

I wrote her name on the emergency-contact line.

The operating room lights were round and merciless. Behind the curtain, someone counted instruments while pressure dragged through my body. I waited for a cry and heard only clipped instructions, then shoes moving quickly away.

“Where is she?” I asked.

The anesthesiologist leaned close enough that I could see my reflection in her protective glasses. “Your daughter is breathing, but she needs the neonatal team. They’re taking care of her.”

Sophie entered the world without either parent holding her.

I woke with an empty ache where my pregnancy had been and a heavier one below it. A transfusion line entered my arm. Only the monitor and hallway light broke the darkness.

The surgeon’s note said the incision might heal before my blood count recovered. For weeks, dizziness could come without warning. If it happened while I held Sophie, I was to sit down immediately, not prove I could endure it.

Olivia sat beside the bed, still in her wedding dress beneath a borrowed hospital blanket. Mud had dried gray along the lace. She handed me my phone without speaking.

There were no missed calls from Daniel.

One message waited on the screen, timestamped while I had been in surgery.

*Rachel finally fell asleep. I’m leaving soon.*

He had written it as if I were still sitting safely at the lodge, waiting for him to finish being needed. My own messages—*I’m bleeding. Bring the SUV back now*—sat directly above his.

The nurse brought a NICU photograph. Sophie lay beneath clear plastic, wires crossing her tiny chest and one fist closed beside her cheek. My wedding ring had left a pale indentation on my finger; Sophie’s hospital bracelet circled an ankle no wider than my thumb.

I pressed the photograph to my sternum until its edge hurt.

“Is Maya still practicing family law?” I asked.

Olivia’s face tightened, but she did not ask whether I was certain. She reached for her phone.

“Call her,” I said. “What I need now is a divorce lawyer, not a husband.”