When My Husband Let His Mistress Destroy Our Baby

The ambulance lights painted the brownstone red and blue. I watched them through my eyelashes. A paramedic leaned over me. Her voice sounded far away.

"Can you tell me your name?"

I tried to answer. My mouth wouldn't work right.

Someone lifted me onto a stretcher. The movement sent fresh pain through my stomach. I made a sound I didn't recognize.

"Easy," the paramedic said. "We've got you."

The neighbor from two doors down stood on the sidewalk in her bathrobe. Mrs. Chen. She must have heard the fall. Must have called for help. I wanted to thank her but the ambulance doors were already closing.

The hospital was bright. Too bright. Faces appeared above me. Strangers asking questions. I answered what I could. My name. My age. Whether I was allergic to anything.

They wheeled me through white corridors. Through double doors. Into a room that smelled like disinfectant and fear.

A doctor came. She was younger than I expected. She pressed cold hands against my abdomen. I flinched.

"I need to do an ultrasound," she said. "Is that okay?"

I nodded.

She squeezed gel onto my stomach. The wand pressed down. I watched her face while she stared at the screen. Her expression changed. Something shifted behind her eyes.

"Ms. Perkins," she said quietly. "Were you aware you were pregnant?"

The room tilted.

"What?"

"You're measuring at approximately six weeks." She paused. The wand moved across my skin. "I'm very sorry. There's no heartbeat."

I stared at the ceiling tiles. Counted them. Twelve across. Eight down. Ninety-six total.

"The fall caused significant trauma," the doctor continued. Her voice was gentle. Professional. "We'll need to do a procedure to—" She stopped. Started again. "I'm also seeing considerable scarring in the uterine lining. Likely from the impact. Future pregnancies will be extremely difficult. Not impossible, but the likelihood is very low."

Ninety-six tiles. White with small black flecks.

"Do you understand what I'm telling you?"

I understood. I was pregnant. Now I wasn't. I might never be again. James had stood on the landing and watched Stormi kick me. Watched me fall. Watched me bleed.

And he'd walked away.

"Yes," I said.

The doctor squeezed my hand. "I'll give you some time. A nurse will be in shortly to discuss next steps."

She left. The door closed with a soft click.

I lay in the quiet room and felt nothing. No tears. No screams. Just a vast, cold emptiness where something had been growing without my knowledge. A future I'd never planned for. A child I'd never meet.

James had pressured me into terminating a pregnancy two years ago. Said the timing wasn't right. Said we needed to wait. I'd grieved alone in our bathroom while he painted in his studio.

Now I'd lost another. And this time, I might never get the chance again.

I pulled out my phone. My hands were steady. I opened the home security app. Found the footage from this morning. Watched Stormi grab my arm. Watched her lean in close. Watched her foot drive into my stomach.

Watched James stand motionless on the landing.

I uploaded the video to Twitter. To Instagram. To TikTok. I didn't write a caption. I didn't need to. The footage spoke for itself.

Then I opened my texts.

Me: *I need you.*

Cassidy: *On my way.*

I set the phone on my chest and closed my eyes.

Sixty-three minutes later, the door opened.

Cassidy still wore her courtroom blazer. Her heels clicked across the tile. She stopped beside the bed and looked at me. Really looked. Her expression cracked.

"Oh, Amber."

She sat down. Took my hand. Didn't say anything else.

I broke then. Not loudly. Just tears that came and wouldn't stop. Cassidy held my hand and let me shake and didn't try to fix it.

When I finally went quiet, she pulled a tissue from the box on the side table. Handed it to me.

"Tell me what you need," she said.

I wiped my face. "I need him to have nothing."

Her expression changed. Became something sharper. "Okay."

"I need a restraining order. I need divorce papers. I need to make sure he can't come near me. Can't call me. Can't—"

"Done." Cassidy pulled out her phone. Started typing. "I'm filing the emergency restraining order right now. Judge Morrison owes me a favor. We'll have it by morning."

"I'm not going back to that house."

"You're not going anywhere near that house." She kept typing. "Where do you want to go?"

I thought about the penthouse on the Upper East Side. The father I hadn't spoken to in six years. The apology I'd never made.

"Home," I said.

Cassidy looked up. Her eyes were wet but her voice was steel. "Then that's where you're going. After we burn his world down from right here."

She stayed until visiting hours ended. She brought me water. She called the nurse when the pain got worse. She sat in the chair beside my bed and made phone calls in her lawyer voice—clipped, precise, merciless.

When she finally left, she squeezed my shoulder.

"You're not going back to being quiet," she said. "Not ever again."

I nodded.

After she was gone, I checked my phone. The videos had gone viral. Tens of thousands of views. Hundreds of comments. People were tagging Columbia. Tagging the art institute. Tagging James.

I turned off the phone and stared at the ceiling.

Ninety-six tiles.

I counted them until I fell asleep.