Chapter 1 - THE BABY WHO WASN’T LILY
Morgan Hale’s phone lit up at 11:47 p.m.
Her mother’s name filled the screen.
Morgan answered quietly so she would not wake Lily, who was asleep beside her in a portable bassinet in Morgan’s Grandview Heights apartment.
“Morgan,” Diane said, breathless, “when are you coming back for the baby?”
Morgan looked down.
Her six-month-old daughter’s chest rose beneath a blue sleeper.
“What are you talking about?”
“The baby. You left her here two hours ago.”
Morgan sat upright.
“Mom, Lily is here with me.”
The line went silent.
Morgan heard a lamp switch click, then the thin cry of an infant.
Diane’s voice returned in a whisper.
“Then whose baby is sleeping in my living room?”
Morgan drove through nearly empty Columbus streets with Lily strapped into the back seat. She called her younger sister Rachel three times. Every call went to voicemail.
Diane opened the door before Morgan knocked.
Her gray cardigan hung crookedly, and her hands were shaking. A yellow-sleepered baby stirred inside the portable crib beside the sofa.
Morgan recognized the round cheeks immediately.
“Ava.”
Rachel’s daughter.
Diane caught Morgan’s wrist and pulled her toward the crib.
“Then whose baby did you leave here?”
“I was never here. Lily never left me.”
Diane blocked her when Morgan tried to approach. She pointed at a diaper bag beside the couch.
It matched Morgan’s exactly.
Same cream canvas. Same leather straps. Same small blue ribbon tied to the zipper.
“She came wearing Lily’s clothes,” Diane said.
Morgan lifted her own daughter higher against her chest.
Ava coughed inside the crib. The sound was wet and tight.
“Mom, don’t let them touch.”
Both babies turned toward each other.
Ava reached through the crib slats and caught Lily’s sleeve.
Lily smiled.
Morgan pulled her back and noticed something beneath Ava’s yellow cuff.
A hospital identification band.
May you like
The printed name was not Ava Bennett.
It was Lily Hale.
