“Completely,” he said.
We had a plan. We had been waiting for the right moment to execute it. And as I sat in that hospital room, my newborn son asleep against my chest, listening to the silence where my husband’s concern should have been — I understood with absolute clarity that the moment had arrived.
Part Three: 8:12 PM
I called Martin first.
He answered on the second ring, which told me he had been waiting.
“Claire? Is the baby here?”
“Yes,” I said quietly. “Born at 3:47. He’s healthy. He’s beautiful.” My voice caught slightly on that last word, not from grief but from the simple overwhelming truth of it.
“And Daniel?”
“He took his family to hotpot.”
There was a pause. Then Martin’s tone shifted — not dramatically, just a small recalibration, the sound of a man moving from standby into operational mode.
“Do you want to proceed?”
I looked at my son. His fingers were curled loosely, as though he had just set something down.
“Yes,” I said. “All of it. Lock everything down.”
