Chapter 13 - The Call
Daniel stood alone in the hospital stairwell and dialed.
A woman answered on the fourth ring.
“Hello?”
He could not speak.
The voice was older, cautious, but unmistakable.
“Who is this?” she asked.
Daniel pressed one hand against the wall.
“Rebecca?”
Silence.
Then a sharp breath.
The call ended.
Daniel dialed again.
No answer.
He sent a photograph—the image from the mountain, showing Emma wrapped in the rescue blanket, alive.
Under it, he wrote:
Your daughter survived. She needs you.
Seconds passed.
Then the phone rang.
Rebecca was crying when Daniel answered.
“Is she really alive?”
“Yes.”
“And the baby?”
“The doctors are delivering him now.”
Rebecca struggled to breathe.
“I watched her from a distance for years. I thought leaving her was the only way to keep her safe.”
“You should have contacted me.”
“I didn’t know Samuel had betrayed us. I thought someone close to you was feeding Evelyn information.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“All this time…”
“I’m sorry.”
“No. Come here.”
Rebecca hesitated.
“Evelyn knows I’m alive now.”
“She’ll never touch you again.”
Inside the operating room, Emma fought through exhaustion, cold injuries, and fear.
The baby’s heart rate dropped again.
Doctors urged her to push.
She thought of Michael’s hands peeling her fingers from the cliff.
She thought of Daniel catching her before her head struck the rock.
She thought of Rebecca giving up her entire life so Emma could have one.
“I’m not losing him,” Emma said.
With one final effort, her son was born.
For a terrible moment, he made no sound.
The room became intensely quiet.
Then a cry broke through the silence.
Emma sobbed.
A nurse placed the baby against her chest.
He was small, pale, and furious at the world.
Perfect.
Emma touched his cheek.
“Hi, Noah.”
Daniel entered later wearing clean hospital clothes.
His face crumpled when he saw them.
“He’s beautiful.”
Emma looked toward the doorway.
“Did you reach her?”
Daniel nodded.
“Your mother is alive.”
Emma’s joy collided with thirty-one years of unanswered pain.
“Is she coming?”
“She’s already on her way.”
Before Emma could respond, Detective Ramirez entered.
Evelyn’s attorneys had filed an emergency petition claiming Michael was the baby’s legal father and should have access to his son.
Emma held Noah closer.
Daniel’s expression turned cold.
May you like
“They’re still trying to reach the trust.”
👉 Even from a jail cell, Michael was using his newborn son as his final path to Emma’s fortune.
