The Baby Thief

by L. J. Sellers

  He locked the truck and sauntered a hundred yards up the street. The manager’s apartment was the first one on the ground floor. He rapped sharply on the door.

  A voice from inside yelled, “Just a minute.” Zeke waited while the young man took his time opening the door. He was a good-looking kid, but his hair was too long and his clothes smelled musty. He smiled agreeably, though, when he saw Zeke. “We don’t have any vacancies right now, but I can put you on a list.”

  “I’m looking for my niece. Her name’s Darcie, and she’s nine months pregnant. I promised her I’d be here in time for the birth, but she isn’t home. I’m worried that she’s already gone to the hospital.”

  “She went last night. I loaned her cab fare.”

  “Which hospital?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Have you heard anything about the baby?”

  The manager shook his head. “Any chance you’ve got the ten bucks she owes me? I sure could use it. If it had been anybody but Darcie, I’d never have loaned the cash.”

  “Sure.” Zeke dug two fives out of his wallet. It wasn’t much to pay for a friend in the right place. “Thanks. See you around.”

  He headed for the phone booth at the 7-11. He called North McKenzie first and got lucky. The lady said Darcie and the baby were both fine but would have to stay in the hospital for a few days. Zeke thanked her politely, hung up the phone, and let out a stream of profanities. He’d been patient for a long time. Now he wanted to get the hell down the road. He put another quarter in the slot and dialed the lawyer.

  “Mr. Johnson? This is Zeke Brothers. Al said to call when the baby was born.”

  The lawyer spoke softly but with urgency. “Are you in possession of the child now?”

  “Not exactly. The baby has to stay in the hospital for a few days.”

  “Anything serious?”

  “No. Just a rough labor.”

  “When you have the merchandise, call me at 345-2870. I’ll have the cash.” The phone clicked in Zeke’s ear. He repeated the number to himself while he ran inside the store to borrow a pen. He pulled out the picture of his sister he’d been carrying around for forty years and wrote the number on the back. Elise would understand. This was important.

  Exhausted and frustrated, he climbed in the truck and drove down Seventh Street looking for a motel. Something cheap where they didn’t ask too many questions, but not the one he’d stayed in the night before. He needed sleep. His left arm and shoulder were bothering him from all the driving.

  In the morning, he’d stop in the hospital and see if he could find out exactly when Darcie would be released. He wanted to be waiting, grab the kid before she ever got home.

  Zeke worried about how long he would have to wait. With his picture in the paper—identified as a kidnapper—and the reporter who had seen him now dead, it wasn’t a good idea to hang around town long. If the hospital said Darcie had to stay more than two days, he’d head back out to the compound, slip in and quietly smother the kidnapped woman, then take off for Florida or Mexico.

  Zeke decided he would make copies of Carmichael’s computer files while he was in the compound. Just in case the Reverend got worked up over Jenna’s death and decided to turn against him. It never hurt to keep an edge.

  Chapter 36

  Sunday, Nov. 5, 3:32 p.m.

  Using the tip of his scalpel, Carmichael made a tiny incision in the folds of Jenna’s belly button and a second incision near her pubis. He pushed a hollow needle through the first opening and pumped a small amount of carbon dioxide into the abdomen cavity to create visibility and space to maneuver. He removed the needle and inserted a narrow ultrasound probe. After locating her right ovary, Carmichael began to search for mature egg follicles, which would appear as black spheres on the monitor.

  The procedure was routine for him; he’d performed at least a dozen in the last two years. Liz was nervous though, he could tell. She often extracted genetic material from embryos for testing but had never searched ovarian fluid for mature oocytes. Carmichael would have preferred to have Rachel on hand, but Liz wouldn’t allow it. She didn’t want Rachel to know the eggs were for her, nor did she trust Rachel’s abilities. Liz insisted on being his only assistant. This was her baby. Fortunately, the transfer, which would be done in a day or so, was a quick procedure that he could do unaided.

  In a moment, Carmichael spotted his first ripe follicle. He slipped an aspiration needle through the opening he’d made near the pubis. Eyes back on the monitor, he guided the needle to the ripe follicle, pushed it in, and punctured the sphere. Quickly pressing the suction pump, he drained the follicle. Strawberry-colored fluid flowed out the connecting hose into a test tube.

  “First one.” He let go of the aspiration needle just long enough to grab the tube and hand it to Liz through the pass-bar. She was in the embryo lab next door, but he could see her head and shoulders through the opening. This was where Rachel would have been handy. Jenna was completely paralyzed and unconscious from the ketamine, so the risk of the patient seeing Liz was minimal.

  Liz started at the tube, transfixed. Finally she whispered, “My baby.”

  It was his opportunity to say what had been on his mind all morning. “It could be our baby, Liz.”

  She looked up at him, stunned. “I thought you never wanted to have another child.”

  “I’ve come to feel differently in the last week. Your passion to be a mother rejuvenated me. I want to be the father of your child.” Jenna’s child, he corrected silently, automatically turning the probe back and forth in search of another follicle.

  Liz sounded panicked. “I don’t see how that could work. I can’t live here, and you’re not planning to give up the church.”

  “I could still be her father.” Carmichael located a second ripe follicle and penetrated it. “You could bring her out here on weekends sometimes.”

  “I can’t.” Liz had her eye pressed to the Olympus microscope and didn’t look up. “I can’t share this child with anyone.”

  “What about when she’s older? When she asks about her daddy?” Carmichael siphoned the oocyte into a second tube and handed it through the opening to Liz. He gripped the needle again, then continued his search with the ultrasound probe.

  After a long pause Liz said. “I’ll tell her the truth.”

  “What truth?” Carmichael scoffed. “That her father was a sperm donor who got paid a hundred bucks to jack off in a cup?” He wished he could see Liz’s expression, but he kept his eyes on the monitor. The procedure required concentrated hand/eye coordination. She was silent, so he continued, “That you don’t know his name, only that his sperm was the healthiest of the bunch.” Liz started to protest, but he cut her off. “Or will you tell her the other truth—that you stole her from her mother, who happens to be your sister?”

  He could hear Liz sucking in air and fighting back sobs. Carmichael cursed himself. He’d gone too far. And his timing was ridiculous. Finding and separating the oocytes from the bloody ovarian fluid needed to be done quickly and correctly.

  “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I just don’t want your daughter to have the same anxieties about who her parents are that you’ve had all your life.”

  “She won’t.” Liz spit the words out. “She’ll have a real mother and that’s enough. Let’s finish this. We only have two eggs so far.”

  They worked in silence for the next fifteen minutes. Carmichael located and siphoned three more follicles, in which Liz found a total of four oocytes. He’d expected more. From what he could tell with the limited probing he’d done, Jenna’s reproductive system seemed remarkably free of scarring or endometriosis. He moved to the left ovary and immediately discovered a large cyst, which looked suspiciously like a teratoma.

  Carmichael frowned, muttering to himself.

  “What is it?” Liz had heard him.

  “It looks like a teratoma on her left ovary.”

  “Any possibility of harvesting th
e follicles?”

  “None.”

  She cursed softly.

  Carmichael wondered if he should remove it. Sometimes these cysts were harmless. Sometimes they grew—causing extreme pain—until they ruptured, resulting in hemorrhaging and possibly death. He couldn’t worry about that right now. The six oocytes needed his immediate attention. He gently removed the probe and needle. “Time to close up.”

  Liz was disappointed. “Is six going to be enough? The survival rate is never a hundred percent.”

  “That may be true in your clinic, but not in mine.” He put two tiny dissolvable stitches in the incisions. “Remember, the first in vitro baby was conceived with a single egg produced naturally without the aid of superovulatory hormones.”

  “I know. It’s just that in the ARC, sometimes they retrieve ten to fifteen oocytes, and still the woman doesn’t always get pregnant.”

  Carmichael wiped Jenna’s incisions with rubbing alcohol and put a sterile bandage on each. He leaned through the pass-bar and grinned at Liz.

  “Have faith, I’m the best.”

  She smiled thinly. “Why don’t you come in here and take over? The sooner we get them fertilized, the sooner we can do the transfer and get her out of here.”

  “Are you sure you won’t let me be the father?”

  “I can’t.”

  “Then get me the daddy you picked out.”

  Elizabeth had brought the frozen sperm in a cooler packed with dry ice. She had taken it out to thaw just before they began the egg retrieval. Carmichael wouldn’t let her see how troubled he was. He didn’t want to admit it to himself. He had to stop thinking about Jenna. Soon she would be gone from his life forever.

  He worked quickly in the darkened lab, cleaning each egg and placing it in a drop of culture medium, then encapsulating each drop in mineral oil. The oil sealed the egg from the outside world and protected it against dust, temperature shifts, and the natural exchange of gases in the air. The six droplets were placed in a petri dish and slid into the incubator where they were kept at ninety-eight degrees.

  Carmichael normally incubated oocytes for three hours before fertilizing them, but today he would leave them only for an hour. In fact, he planned to do the entire process as quickly as possible. Whether Liz got pregnant hardly mattered to him at this point. He had tried to give her the right baby, and his debt to her was paid. All he cared about was getting Jenna out of his church before the police found her. Two hours could make a world of difference.

  He wheeled Jenna back into her room. He’d given her a large dose of ketamine combined with Versed to ensure that she didn’t come out too soon like last time. It was a dangerous combination. She might never wake up, which could be a blessing. Carmichael could hear Liz pacing nervously in the entry hall. He was worried about her. She seemed to have aged overnight and had pulsated with tension all afternoon.

  Carmichael made a sudden decision. He closed and locked the door behind him.

  Lifting the drape that covered Jenna’s body, he ran his hands over her breasts and between her legs. He had to unzip his pants and release his erection immediately. Carmichael found a plastic cup in the nightstand next to her bed and stroked himself vigorously, ejaculating in a few minutes. He couldn’t have Jenna, but he could be the father of her child.

  He unlocked the door and peeked into the surgery area. Liz was still out in the hall, pacing. He could hear her muttering to herself. He moved quickly through the swinging doors into the embryo lab, spotting Elizabeth’s tube of donor sperm in a rack next to the incubator. Carmichael searched a supply cupboard for an identical one.

  He pulled the sterilized wrap off the tube, squeezed the plastic cup to form a funnel and poured his semen into the new tube. He looked up to see Liz staring through the glass in the upper half of the hall doors.

  Carmichael waved and smiled, praying she hadn’t caught on to what he was doing. Liz didn’t respond.

  He turned his back to her and switched the tubes. The one she’d brought was still cool and damp from condensation. Carmichael set it in the stainless steel refrigerator, afraid that Liz would see it later if he tossed it in the waste basket. He turned back to the double swinging doors. Liz hadn’t moved. He motioned her to come in. She seemed not to notice. Carmichael worried about her state of mind. She obviously wasn’t handling the stress of the situation well at all.

  It hadn’t been quite an hour yet, so he killed time by sanitizing his instruments from the retrieval surgery. Liz resumed pacing the hall. Carmichael decided not to wait any longer. He pulled the petri dish from the incubator and placed it under a warming light.

  Using an eyedropper, he unleashed a million or so fresh spermatozoa on the unsuspecting oocytes, then slid the petri dish under a microscope. As he’d expected, his sperm were plentiful, active, and strong. In a few seconds, the first egg was under attack, surrounded by dozens of blind warriors. Carmichael loved this part, the penetration of the zona pellucida, followed by the submission of the female genetic material. It was the miracle of life. God, in his great wisdom, had masterminded this beautiful and loving conquest of the fragile female ovum. Carmichael had witnessed the miracle dozens of times, but this time was special. It was his seed becoming one with Jenna. It was the most glorious four minutes of his life.

  He watched the six newly formed zygotes until his right eye ached with the strain, then placed the petri dish back in the incubator.

  Now the wait began. It would be hours before the cells started to divide, displaying their viability or weaknesses. Then Carmichael would transfer the healthy zygotes to a culture of pig fetal tissue to accelerate growth. Then they would have to wait another ten to fifteen hours for the embryos to develop to an eight-cell blastocyst stage. At that point, they could remove two of the cells, expand the genetic material with PCR, and screen for sex differentiation. Like all the Sisters, Liz wanted a girl.

  Chapter 37

  Sunday, Nov. 5, 3:35 p.m.

  Undaunted by his earlier collapse, Eric sat up that afternoon and buzzed for a nurse. A tall blond woman showed up about five minutes later. Eric thought that a person with a real emergency could have died in the meantime, but he kept it to himself.

  “I’m starving. Do you think I could have something to eat?”

  “Sure. I’m glad you’re feeling better. Be back in a bit.”

  She brought him a tray with green Jell-O and a small dish of rice pudding. Eric was heartbroken. “Could I have some real food, please?”

  “It’s too soon. If you vomit or choke you could pull out your stitches. Tomorrow you can have a sandwich, I promise.” She smiled, checked his IV line, and left him alone with the mush.

  Eric hated rice pudding, but he was starving so he gulped it down without letting it touch his taste buds. As he was savoring the lime Jell-O, Joe waltzed in.

  “Hey, you’re alive.”

  “Damn lucky to be, so I hear.”

  “You were right all along about the kidnapping.” Joe sat and scooted the chair in close to Eric. “I mean, why else would they try to kill you?”

  “Exactly. The guy who stabbed me is an ex-con. Detective Jackson’s checking him out right now. What did you find out about the doctor?”

  Joe scowled. “Nothing for sure, except that he’s not working at any hospitals or birth centers in Oregon, Washington, or California. Tomorrow when the DMV opens, I’ll be able to find out more.

  “I’ve got to get out of here.” Eric hurt just thinking about moving. “I need you to bring me some clothes. You still have a key to my place, right?”

  “Yeah.” Joe’s long brow was deeply furrowed. “Are you sure about this? You’re still looking rather pale and worthless.”

  “I feel pale and worthless, but I have to finish this. I can’t lie here while you and Jackson put this story to bed. You know how it is.”

  Joe nodded. “Shoes and everything, right?”

  “Might as well. I don’t know what happened to the stuff I was wearin
g when I came in, and I’m afraid to ask.”

  “I’ll bring your stuff tomorrow. Anything else you need?”

  “No, tonight!”

  Joe shook his head. “You can’t leave tonight. You were stabbed in the chest yesterday. You have to wait at least another day.”

  “Fine, but bring the clothes tonight anyway. I’ll leave first thing in the morning.”

  “Promise you won’t leave tonight.”

  “I promise.” Eric was relieved. His body wasn’t ready. “Thanks, Joe.”

  “See you in a while.” The reporter headed for the door.

  “Hey, bring me something to eat, would you?” Eric didn’t care what the nurse said. He needed to get his strength back. “All I got for dinner was some lousy Jell-O.”

  “Whopper with cheese?”

  “Make it two.”

  At the moment, a little cholesterol was the least of his worries.

  Chapter 38

  Monday, Nov. 6, 8:07 a.m.

  Elizabeth slid the glass dish under the microscope. Only four of the embryos had been viable. Two of them had never begun to divide. David claimed the oocytes had not been mature enough. But the remaining four were doing great. She’d been skeptical about the pig fetal tissue at first, but David had reassured her it would speed the process and he’d been right, as usual. The embryo under the microscope had already reached the six-cell stage. She decided to go ahead and test it.

  David was in the next room taking a short nap. He’d been up all night checking the embryos every hour and would be irritated at her for proceeding without him. This was his lab and sex selection was his specialty. But slurping embryo cells for genetic testing was a newly acquired technique for Elizabeth. She’d recently done two pre-implantation diagnoses at the ARC and was anxious to repeat her success.