Inside the small bathroom of her quiet lakeside cabin in northern Colorado, steam covered the mirror as Angela stared at her reflection and barely recognized the woman looking back. Her face looked thinner, her eyes darker with sleepless nights, and her large belly shifted gently as the baby inside moved again with strong little kicks.
She rested both hands on her stomach and breathed slowly.
“You will be here soon, my sweet boy,” she whispered softly. “You will only know your mother’s love, and I promise that will be enough.”
Even while she spoke the words, doubt buzzed quietly in the back of her mind like a stubborn insect that refused to disappear.
Angela had built her technology consulting company entirely on her own, and she had never relied on inherited wealth or famous family connections. She had earned contracts one difficult negotiation at a time, endured countless rejections, and survived the kind of failures that forced many people to give up.
Yet none of that strength had prepared her for a dangerous pregnancy that she faced alone, hidden far away from large hospitals and curious reporters.