Chapter 2 - FORTY-SEVEN MINUTES
I did not climb into the trench willingly.
Derek grabbed my upper arm and forced me toward it.
I resisted, but not hard enough to risk falling on my stomach.
That was the calculation pregnancy had taught me.
Every movement had another body inside it.
My heel slipped.
The mud gave way.
I dropped waist-deep into the trench.
Cold earth squeezed my legs.
My belly stayed above the mud.
I put both arms around it.
Derek stood over me.
Then he lifted the wooden stick and slammed it into the mud beside my hip.
Dirt sprayed across my shirt.
“You leave me, you leave with nothing.”
I stared up at him.
The blue flowerpot sat behind his left shoulder.
Phone inside.
Recording had started when motion triggered beside the patio.
I did not know that yet.
Derek grabbed my hair.
Yanked me backward.
Pain flashed through my scalp.
“You’re not taking my kid anywhere.”
He let go.
I kept one arm over my belly.
Then I saw the garden hose.
The valve ran along the low fence beside my bare right foot.
If I could open it, water would flood the trench.
Mud would loosen.
Maybe enough to climb out.
Derek kept talking.
That was his weakness when angry.
He needed speeches.
Needed me to understand his logic.
“You think Claire’s going to save you?”
I said nothing.
“You think your sister wants you with a baby and no husband?”
Still nothing.
His face darkened.
“Answer me.”
“What do you want me to say?”
“The truth.”
“The truth is I’m scared of you.”
He froze.
For years, I had avoided that sentence.
He looked almost offended.
Then:
“You’re scared because you make me angry.”
There it was.
Perfect.
I needed him away from me.
I pointed toward the patio.
“My water.”
He looked.
Blue flowerpot.
Plastic cup beside it.
“Stay.”
He walked three steps away.
Enough.
I moved my left hand into the mud as if steadying myself.
Then dragged my foot against the hose valve.
Once.
Missed.
Again.
The valve turned.
Water hissed.
Derek looked down.
“What the hell?”
The hose blasted into the trench.
Mud softened around my knees.
I pulled one leg upward.
He lunged.
I yelled:
“I’m taking my baby away from you.”
The backyard gate flew open.
Claire.
Gray T-shirt.
Jeans.
Phone in hand.
She stopped dead.
Saw me.
Saw Derek.
Saw the stick.
Derek lowered it immediately.
His face transformed.
Calm.
Concerned.
“She fell,” he said. “She’s confused.”
Claire looked at me.
I pointed toward the blue flowerpot.
Derek saw.
His face changed.
He lunged.
Claire got there first.
She grabbed the hidden phone.
Backed toward the gate.
The screen was still lit.
Recording timer:
47:13.
Forty-seven minutes.
Every word.
I looked at Derek.
“Forty-seven minutes. Every damn word.”
He froze.
Then pain hit me.
Deep.
Low.
Hard.
My belly tightened under both hands.
I stopped breathing.
Another cramp.
Sharper.
Claire turned toward me.
Her face went white.
That was where a video would cut to black.
Real life did not.
Claire dropped Derek from her attention completely.
“Rachel?”
“I don’t know.”
Another contraction.
Too early.
Too close.
Derek took one step toward me.
Claire held up the recording phone.
“Don’t.”
He stopped.
Then he said something that later mattered in court.
“She’s faking it.”
Claire stared at him.
My water had not broken.
No blood.
But the contractions kept coming.
Claire called 911.
Derek started toward the gate.
Then hesitated.
Escape or performance.
He chose performance.
Stayed.
Told responders I had fallen into the trench while gardening.
Claire said:
“No. He put her there.”
The hidden phone kept recording.
So did Claire’s own phone now.
The ambulance arrived twelve minutes later.
Police came six minutes after that.
The last thing I saw before they lifted me from the mud was Derek standing beside the blue flowerpot.
Not looking at me.
Looking at the phone.
Like the object had betrayed him.
May you like
It had not.
He had betrayed himself for forty-seven uninterrupted minutes.
