The Stolen Breath

by L. G. Davis

  I have been a follower of your blog for years, but today, I’m unsubscribing to all of your posts.

  Goodbye.

  She doesn’t sign the email with her name, just ending it abruptly.

  As bile rushes to the back of my throat, I cover my mouth with my hand and stumble to the bathroom. I get ready to retch into the toilet bowl, but nothing comes out. The only thing that drips into the water are my tears.

  Chapter 13

  Inever thought it would get better, but it has.

  It’s been a week since I wrote the blog post—which I finally deleted—and I’m still getting angry emails. I don’t read them, though, not anymore. They hurt me too much. I delete most of them without bothering to open them. But they did trigger something inside me. They shook me awake.

  “We’re doing fine, aren’t we, Lea?” I tickle her feet. I’ve changed her diaper and she’s a picture of contentment.

  She blinks several times, then gives me a huge smile.

  I was wrong. She does love me. No matter what I or anyone else thinks, I’m the perfect mother for her, even when I mess up.

  “All right, pumpkin, mommy needs to go to the bathroom.” I pick her up from the changing table and kiss her on the nose before lowering her into her crib.

  At first it looks as though she’s going to cry, but when I give her a favorite teddy bear, she changes her mind and starts cooing instead.

  I let out a sigh of relief. I feel great today. I slept well. Lea only woke up once last night. It’s the most she has ever slept since Madison left.

  “I’ll see you in a bit, sweetheart.”

  I blow her a kiss and head to the bathroom. The bathroom looks brighter than usual or maybe it’s because I feel better and I’m seeing the world with fresh eyes. I do my business on the toilet and remain sitting there, staring at my surroundings as if seeing them for the first time. Then the tears spring to my eyes.

  This time, I’m not crying because I’m hurt, but because I’m so relieved that we have made it. I have made it. I’m not the failure I thought I was. I’m not that evil mother everyone thinks I am online. I pulled it off without Madison.

  Tough times may still come, but I’m determined to face them head on. The one thing the haters did for me was give me the shot in the arm I needed to pull myself off the floor and get back to my feet, to fight, to prove them wrong.

  I smile when Lea’s soft laughter makes its way through the walls. I can finally enjoy her. In fact, I plan to take her to the play group again today, and this time I intend on being fully present.

  I finish on the toilet and turn on the water in the shower. Since Lea is happy, I might as well clean myself up.

  Without giving it a second thought, I strip off my pajamas and jump inside, turning the water to hot, raising my head upward so it can dance on my face. I close my eyes and enjoy the relaxing sensation of the soothing liquid sliding down my body to pool at my feet before disappearing into the drain, taking with it all my worries.

  I’m so relaxed that I don’t keep track of how much time I spend under the streaming water. It’s only when I wash my hair that bittersweet memories sneak up on me.

  Andrew used to love washing my long hair. Even when we were not taking a shower together, he often told me to call him when it was time for my hair to be washed. He said it was relaxing for him. The care he took as he rubbed shampoo into my locks and took his time rinsing it out made me feel cherished.

  I’ll never feel his hands on my scalp again.

  He’s gone, but he left me a gift. I’ll never take Lea for granted again. I intend to be the best mother I possibly can. As far as I’m concerned, today will be the first day of the rest of our lives.

  I step out of the shower. The air from the window caresses my skin, cooling it, awakening goose bumps.

  Instead of wiping myself down with a towel, I grab a fluffy morning robe and push my feet into my peach slippers.

  The silence is relaxing. Lea must have fallen asleep.

  I finish brushing my teeth and head to her room.

  My stomach drops when I find her crib empty.

  I whirl around and search every corner of the room. She’s nowhere.

  I rush back to the crib in case I’m imagining things. I’m not.

  “Lea,” I call out, turning in circles, confusion clouding my mind.

  She doesn’t respond. The house is completely silent.

  My mouth is dry as I search each room, feeling sick to my stomach. “Where are you, baby?” I call out, trying not to fear the worst. She’s not even downstairs in the living room or kitchen.

  Shaking, I sink to the bottom of the stairs, and gasp for air. My baby is gone. Someone took her.

  Madison. It has to be her.

  I jump to my feet, but I sink back down. My knees are not strong enough to carry my weight. I force myself back up and go upstairs to get my phone. I find it on the armchair in the nursery. With it pressed to my ear, I crumple to the nursery floor, numb with shock, waiting for someone to answer the call.

  “Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?”

  “My baby’s missing. Someone stole her from her crib. I think it’s our former nanny.”

  I give the female dispatcher all the information she needs.

  After she promises to send an officer to the house, I hang up the phone and call Anita. Maybe she let herself in and took Lea in order to help me out.

  “Delia, are you okay?” she sounds concerned.

  “Do you have Lea? Please tell me you have her.” I push the words through my throat. By the time they leave my lips, they’re distorted.

  “Delia, calm down. I can’t hear what you’re saying.”

  I try again in a calmer tone. “Is Lea with you? She’s gone.”

  It takes a while for Anita to respond. When she finally does, her voice is low and husky. “What do you mean she’s gone?”

  “Someone took her.” I continue to search the house. “I was in the shower and someone entered the house and took her. She was in her crib.”

  “Oh, my God.” The panic in her voice is clear through the line. “She’s not with me. Are you really sure she’s not somewhere in the house?”

  “Yes. I searched everywhere. She couldn’t have climbed out of her crib.” I clutch my chest. “I called the police.”

  “I’m coming over,” Anita says and we hang up.

  When Anita arrives, she finds me on the edge of madness, my head spinning. Together, we search the house again and we still don’t find Lea.

  “I’m sure there’s an explanation.” She rests her chin on the top of my head. “Let’s not fear the worst.”

  “How can I not fear the worst? I know it’s Madison. She’s crazy.” I break the embrace and bury my hands in my hair, then I glance at my wristwatch. “What’s taking the police so long?”

  “I’m sure they will be here soon.” Anita folds her arms across her chest. “But what if it’s not Madison?”

  “It is her.” I grit my teeth. “She tried to steal Lea once. She came back to finish the job.”

  “But you changed the locks. How would she get in?”

  “I don’t know, but it was her, Anita. You know it was her.”

  She pulls me into another hug. “Everything will be all right.”

  I want to believe her words, but it’s hard. I pull away again. “This is my punishment. It’s my punishment for writing that stupid blog post.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Anita says, her hand on my arm. She looks as worried as I feel. “This is not your fault in any way.”

  “But it is. I knew it.” I clench my hands into fists. “Deep down I knew Madison would return. She was too obsessed with Lea not to. I should have called the police that day.”

  That fear had been nagging at me for days, but I swallowed it down, telling myself I was being ridiculous and Madison was gone forever. The agency that had provided her to us even told me that she was no longer one of their nannies, after apologi
zing profusely for the trouble Madison had caused me.

  The way she had looked at me that day, the hurt and anger in her eyes, said everything. I should have known that it was far from over.

  Now I’m paying the price for my foolishness.

  WHEN A POLICE OFFICER arrives, I’m still shaking and in my damp bathrobe, which I didn’t have the strength to change from.

  Anita had tried and failed several times to calm me down. I would never be able to find peace until I find Lea. Who knows what else Madison is capable of?

  Officer Mark Randall is a stocky man with a shock of white hair on his temples and eyes of an unusual green color, which are magnified by wire-rimmed glasses.

  Before he even steps into the house, I beg him again to find Lea.

  “Let’s have a chat first,” he says. He’s too calm for my liking. Doesn’t he sense the urgency in the situation?

  While we talk, Anita makes us coffee. I started drinking coffee shortly after Madison left. The machine was there and I needed something that wasn’t medication to help me handle the stress.

  It’s only when I look at Officer Randall properly that I recognize him. he was one of the officers who came to tell me about what happened to Andrew.

  “Mrs. Caswell, when was the last time you saw your baby?”

  “A little over an hour ago. I left her in her crib while I took a shower.”

  He jots my answer down. “How long do you think you were in the bathroom for?”

  “I’m not sure...maybe twenty or thirty minutes. But for a while I could hear her playing and laughing. The walls are not thick.”

  He taps his lips with his ballpoint pen. “Are you completely sure that you put her in the crib? Could you have maybe left her to crawl around on the floor? She could have crawled out of the room.”

  Anger surges through me. “No, she couldn’t have, Officer. I definitely left her in her crib.”

  The officer scribbles more words in his notebook before looking up with more questions in his eyes. “What happened after you came back to the nursery?”

  “Like I said, I found her gone.” Having to repeat things I already said only wastes time that could be spent searching for Lea. “I looked everywhere. Then I called my friend, Anita.” I glance at Anita, who’s sitting rigid in an armchair.

  “Lea is not in this house, Officer,” Anita says.

  “I know our former nanny took her,” I cut in. “Her name is Madison Price. She was obsessed with my daughter.”

  “Obsessed in what way?” The officer frowns.

  “She did everything to distance me from her. The day I asked her to leave, she had Lea in the car at three in the morning.”

  “And why didn’t you call us?”

  “I don’t know.” I chew a corner of a nail. “I really don’t. I guess after I got Lea back, I didn’t see the need. I didn’t really think she would come back for her.” The fear was always at the back of my mind, but I shrugged it off.

  “I see.” The officer jots a few words down on his notepad and looks up again. “And you’re sure that the nanny took your daughter?”

  “Some things a mother just knows. So, yes, I am sure.” My shoulders slump forward. “After I told her I didn’t need her anymore, she said some hurtful things.”

  “Can you be more specific?”

  I nod. “She said I don’t deserve Lea, that I don’t deserve to be a mother.”

  The officer pushes a hand through his thick hair. “Would you be able to give me this woman’s address so we can look her up?”

  “I actually don’t have the address. She was living with us. But the nanny agency where I hired her from will have it.” I pick my phone up from next to me on the couch and scroll through the contacts until I find the number belonging to Little Cradle. Officer Randall writes it down and gives me back the phone.

  “Is there anything else I should know?”

  I hesitate before responding. “Two days ago, I wrote a blog post. I’m a blogger. That night I was overwhelmed and thought writing down my emotions might help.” I let out a breath. “I thought I saved it as a draft, but in the morning, I found that I published it by mistake. It attracted a lot of comments.”

  The last thing I need is for the officer to also think I’m a terrible mother, but I need to share with him all the information he might need to find my daughter. I will not allow history to repeat itself. Lea’s case will not end up unsolved, like her father’s.

  He leans forward, resting his hands on his knees as though he can’t wait to hear what I have to say. “What kinds of comments?”

  “Scathing comments and emails from my blog followers, I think.”

  “What exactly was said?”

  “They said I do not deserve to be a mother.”

  “The same thing your nanny said about you, am I right?” A shadow crosses his features. “Are you suspecting that one of those comments was from Madison Price?”

  I shrug. “I don’t know. Maybe.” The thought had briefly crossed my mind. Now that I think of it, what if it was Madison who sent me that first email? The words sounded as though they would come from her lips.

  “Very well,” Officer Randall says. “I guess there’s no harm in looking into it.” He shuts his notebook and takes a sip of his coffee. “We will try to track down the nanny, but in the meantime, do you mind if I take a quick look around?”

  “No, I don’t.” I don’t think he’ll find her, but there’s no harm. “Please do. Find my baby, Officer.”

  “We’ll do the best we can,” he promises, like his colleague did when Andrew was run over.

  With my permission, he walks around the house, searching every corner.

  After about ten minutes, he returns to the living room, a deep line between his eyebrows. “Mrs. Caswell, after Madison Price left, were you living with anyone else?”

  “No.” I wrap my arms around my body. “Why do you ask?”

  “Your attic looks as though it has been lived in.”

  “The attic?” I haven’t set foot in there since Andrew died. He had used it as a studio during the brief period of time he took up painting. “No one lives in there.”

  “Come with me,” the officer says and Anita and I follow him to the attic. I did not even think to look there.

  Officer Randall is right. In addition to Andrew’s painting supplies, there’s a shabby mattress, a knitted multi-colored blanket, an unopened bottle of water, and a small pocket mirror.

  “This is strange,” I mutter, my insides shaking.

  All the times I felt like I was being watched, I wasn’t imagining things. Someone had been living in my house without me even knowing it. What if that night, Madison came back to the house and made herself at home in my attic, waiting until she could take Lea?

  Chapter 14

  When the sound of a baby crying reaches my ears, I sit up in bed.

  Maybe it was all a bad dream. Maybe Lea is home and no one took her away from me at all.

  In the dark, I run to the nursery, almost tripping on the stairs. I fling the door to the nursery open and flick on the light.

  She’s not in her room. The crib is still empty. My baby is still gone.

  Tears clog my throat, making it hard for me to breathe. I sink to the floor, my head in my hands, giving in to the sobs.

  How ironic.

  I used to hate waking up at night when Lea was crying. Now, I would give anything to have her back. I don’t care whether I never get to sleep again. I regret every single complaint I made while she was with me.

  I don’t know how long it is until I find the strength to pull myself off the floor. I don’t even remember how I got from the nursery to my bedroom, where I crash onto the bed and continue to cry into the pillows.

  It’s been three days and I still haven’t received news about Madison from the police.

  I put up flyers all over town and asked the local paper to feature Lea’s story in case anyone had seen her.

  Not a sin
gle person called with information.

  My baby is still gone and I don’t know if I will ever get her back.

  In the morning, my eyes are swollen and sore. I feel like I’m walking on clouds as I drag myself out of bed to the bathroom.

  Afterward, I stand in the middle of the bathroom, forcing myself to pull it together.

  I have cried. I have prayed. I have begged for my daughter’s return, but nothing is happening.

  I need to do something. I cannot sit around and wait, like I did during the investigation into Andrew’s death. Lea still may be alive.

  But what if the person who has Lea hurts her?

  If it’s really Madison, what if she hurts my baby to punish me for sending her away?

  Feeling numb in body and mind, I throw on jeans and a wrinkled white t-shirt. Then I burst out of the house, buzzing with the adrenaline brought on by fear.

  Yesterday, Anita promised to put up more flyers around town with me. I’m clutching a batch of them underneath my arm as I rush to her house.

  I ring the bell three times, but no one answers.

  I know she’s home because her bike is outside. She never goes anywhere without it.

  I continue ringing the bell. Still no luck.

  My stomach tightens. What if something is wrong? My mind always goes to the worst-case scenario these days, but who can blame me? I rush back to my house and grab the spare key she had given me when I gave her mine.

  By the time I return to her house, my chest is painfully tight. I jam the key in the lock and turn.

  “Anita?” I call, placing the flyers on a claw-foot table by the door.

  I find her in the living room. The first thing that meets my nostrils is the stench of vomit, a mixture of bile and alcohol.

  It’s exactly as I had feared. Anita is lying on the couch, her head resting in yellow and green vomit.

  I try to shake her awake. She only flinches, but doesn’t wake up. The only sounds she makes are inaudible.

  I am considering calling 911 when she opens her bloodshot eyes and glares at me.

  “I’m so sorry. I let you down.” The slur in her voice makes it hard for me to understand what she’s saying.