He Let Our Daughter Die for Twenty-Three Dollars novel · Chapter 4 of 24

Chapter 4: Hang Up

I lifted my daughter out of the bassinet and rubbed her back.

She hung limp in my hands.

Her chest wasn't moving.

"Sheldon!"

He sat up in the dark bedroom and squinted at me.

"What?"

"She's not breathing. Her lips are blue."

He reached for the lamp and switched it on.

He glanced at her and looked away.

"She's fine," he said. "She's asleep."

"Look at her mouth!"

"You've been waiting for a reason all day." He took my phone off my nightstand and held it against his chest. "You can't stand that Brooke fed her and she took it. Don't do this for an audience."

"There's no audience. It's three in the morning."

"Then you're doing it for me."

I almost laughed, and the sound that came out of my throat was ugly.

I ran for the bed and shoved my hand under my pillow.

The prepaid phone was warm from my head.

Sheldon stood up.

"Put that down. Whose is that?"

I dialed nine-one-one with my thumb and turned my back on him.

He caught my elbow.

"Annabel."

"My baby isn't breathing," I said into the phone, loud enough that the dispatcher heard every word. "Please send someone. Please."

Sheldon let go.

He didn't let go because he cared.

He let go because there was a stranger on the line, and Sheldon never did anything wrong where someone could hear.

"Ma'am, I need you to lay her on a flat surface," the dispatcher said. "Tilt her head back a little."

I put my daughter on the bed.

I did everything the voice told me to do.

I covered her nose and mouth with my mouth and breathed in two small puffs.

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