“My son and his wife would never hurt him,” I whispered.
“I understand,” he said calmly. “But we have to look at every possibility.”
Two hours later, Oliver was stable in the neonatal unit. The bleeding had been caught early—he was going to recover.
But the question remained…
Who did this?
My phone rang.
It was my son, Ethan.
“Mom, where are you? We’re home—Lily’s panicking. Where’s Oliver?”
“I’m at the hospital,” I said quietly. “He’s hurt.”
“What? How?!” he shouted.
“There’s a bruise. The doctors say someone squeezed him hard enough to cause internal bleeding.”
Silence.
Then—
“That’s impossible.”
His wife, Lily, took the phone.
“A bruise?” she asked, her voice trembling. “That’s not possible.”
“Why not?” I asked.
She hesitated.
“Because… he already had that mark yesterday.”
My grip tightened.
“You saw it yesterday and didn’t take him in?”
“We thought it was a birthmark,” she said quickly.
Then she added something that made my blood run cold:
“It wasn’t that dark before.”
A terrifying realization hit me.
“If it got worse today… who was with him before I arrived?”
Silence.
Then, barely audible—
“…the nanny.”
Later, Dr. Harris returned with something else.