The Locks That Killed My Babies

Two years ago, I got pregnant for the first time. At ten weeks, a small, silver padlock pendant appeared on our front doorstep. No package slip. No sender info.

Julian laughed off my anxiety, telling me it was probably an early gift from a friend. That very night, sharp cramps tore through my abdomen.

By the time I was rushed to the ER in the dead of night, the baby’s heartbeat was gone. A year ago, I became pregnant again.

I didn't tell a soul, keeping it a secret even from my own mother. Yet at eight weeks, that exact same silver lock mysteriously showed up inside our unfurnished nursery.

The windows were locked tight, and the security cameras showed nobody entering. That was the time I slipped in the bathroom, and lost my second child.

Now, I was pregnant for the third time. In the early morning of my seventh week, I bolted upright from a nightmare, my fingers brushing against something icy cold beneath my pillow.

A third silver lock lay there in absolute silence. I gripped the lock in my trembling hand, a shudder running down my spine. Who in the world wanted my baby dead?

When the bathroom door opened, Julian had just finished his shower. A towel was wrapped around his waist, water still dripping from the tips of his hair.

Seeing me sitting upright on the bed, he froze for a split second. "Why are you awake?" I didn't answer. I simply opened my palm.

The silver lock gleamed coldly under the dim bedside lamp.

Julian’s gaze fell on it, and his brow furrowed almost immediately. "This again?" "It was under my pillow." My voice was barely a whisper. "The bedroom door was locked all night." "No one stepped inside except for you." He paused for two seconds, then picked up his phone from the nightstand. "I’ll have building security check the hallway cameras." "Is that going to do any good?" His thumb froze over the screen. "This is the third time, Julian." Weariness washed over Julian’s face. "Serena, a piece of silver jewelry can’t cause a miscarriage." My fingers tightened violently around the lock.

The sharp edge dug into my palm, the sting keeping me razorsharp. "Every single time it shows up, something terrible happens to our baby." "That’s just a coincidence." "Lightning doesn't strike three times in the exact same spot." Julian reached out to take the lock from my hand, but I jerked it back.

His hand hung suspended in midair. "What do you want to do, then?" "Call the police." I reached for my phone. "There might still be fingerprints on it.

If we hand it to the detectives, they can find out who’s behind this." The screen lit up, but Julian instantly clamped his hand over my wrist.

His grip wasn't brutal, yet it was firm enough that I couldn't pull away. "It’s three in the morning." "You have a history of miscarriages.

The doctor said you cannot get worked up." "Go to sleep.

I’ll have my people look into it tomorrow." I stared into his eyes. "Why do you stop me from calling the cops every single time?" His expression turned thoroughly cold. "Because I don't want everyone thinking my pregnant wife has gone completely paranoid, treating a harmless piece of jewelry like a murder weapon." Those words struck me across the face harder than a physical slap.

I slowly lifted my head. "You think I'm crazy?" "I think you need rest." "After losing our first two babies, I went through a full year of therapy.

Every time I asked you about the investigation, you told me to let it go.

Now a third lock is lying inside our locked bedroom, and you're still telling me to let it go." Word by word, I stared him down. "Julian, are you really trying to protect me, or are you protecting whoever left this lock?

Do you know who it is?" A flicker of irritation flashed across Julian’s eyes. "Who could I possibly know?" "Is it Evelyn?" The second her name left my lips, his entire face visibly stiffened.

It was brief. So fast it was gone in the blink of an eye. Yet I caught it. "Stop imagining things." He grabbed his jacket, turned on his heel, and walked out of the bedroom.

Evelyn had returned to the country two years ago. Exactly two weeks before my first pregnancy. She was Julian’s childhood sweetheart.

Their families had been closely intertwined for decades. Growing up, everyone assumed they would end up married. Later, Evelyn moved abroad, and Julian met me in college.

We dated for seven years and had been married for four. Before she came back, I had never once thought her name could ever pose a threat to my marriage.

The day she landed, Julian went to the airport to pick her up himself. He didn't come home until eleven that night.

A damp patch stained the shoulder of his dress shirt, as if someone had buried their face there and cried for hours.

I asked about it gently, and he merely said Evelyn had just gone through a messy divorce and was emotionally unstable. A few days later, Evelyn came to our house for the first time.

Back then, I had just found out I was pregnant and hadn't even had the chance to break the news to Julian yet.

She stood in our living room, staring fixedly at the empty nursery blueprints pinned to the wall. "Are you two planning on having a baby?" I smiled. "We’ve been trying." Her face went pale as a ghost.

The glass in her hand slipped and shattered against the floor, a shard slicing open her ankle. Julian rushed over almost instantly and scooped her into his arms.

That was the very first time I had ever seen him look so panicked. He didn't even cast a single glance back at me as he carried her straight out the door to the hospital.

That evening, he told me that Evelyn had undergone a traumatic miscarriage abroad.

Due to severe surgical complications, she was left permanently infertile. "She can’t handle hearing about pregnancies right now." "Don't mention babies in front of her again." I didn't know I was already carrying his child at the time, and I just thought he was being overly sensitive.

Three days later, I placed the positive pregnancy test right in front of him. He stared at the two pink lines in total silence for ten full seconds.

I assumed he was simply stunned with joy.

Finally, he pulled me into his arms, his voice unusually quiet. "How did this happen so suddenly?" I laughed and tapped his chest playfully. "We’ve been trying for six months!

How is this sudden?" He didn't say another word. The following morning, the very first silver lock appeared on our front doorstep.

When morning came, Julian acted as if nothing strange had happened the night before and drove me to the clinic for my prenatal checkup.

The OBGYN looked over my ultrasound and lab results with a warm smile. "Fetal heartbeat is strong.

Progesterone is slightly low, but nothing critical." "Given your medical history of two prior losses, you must take your medication on schedule, get plenty of bed rest, and avoid any emotional stress." She prescribed two bottles of white progesterone tablets and went over the exact dosage instructions.

Julian listened even more intently than I did.

He noted down the drug name, the exact milligrams, and the timing on his phone, even asking whether missing a single dose could trigger a complication.

As we walked out of the exam room, he gently rested his arm over my shoulders. "Nothing will go wrong this time." I looked up at him.

Concern and exhaustion were mingled in his eyes. I had loved this face for an entire decade.

I knew the exact way his eyebrows furrowed when he was worried, and I knew the subconscious habit he had of rubbing his thumb against his index finger whenever he lied.

Right now, his index finger was sliding repeatedly against the edge of his phone. "How are you going to investigate the third lock?" I asked. "I’ve already contacted building management." "And if they find something?" "We’ll see what turns up first." "And if it’s another dead end?"

Julian came to a halt. "Serena, your only job right now is keeping this baby safe." "Leave everything else to me." On the drive back, his phone rang.

The incoming number had no contact name.

The moment the person on the other end spoke, his reflex was to turn down the volume. "I can't talk right now." "Did you take the medicine yet?" A woman’s voice leaked faintly through the speaker.

I couldn't catch the rest, except for the tender way she called him, "Julian." Nobody at his corporate firm dared address him by his first name like that. Julian hung up abruptly.

I kept my eyes glued to the window, pretending I hadn't heard a single thing. Once home, he methodically sorted the pills from the clinic into a weekly organizer.

Morning and night compartments, neatly labeled with times. He did it with practiced precision. "I have some business tonight.

Martha will stay here and make sure you take your medicine on time." "Company business?" "Yeah." "Who was that on the phone earlier?" His hands paused briefly over the organizer. "A project manager." "A woman?" "Serena." He snapped the pill organizer shut. "Don't start suspecting everyone just because of that damn lock." I offered a small smile. "I only asked a question." Seeming to realize he had overreacted, he leaned down and pressed a soft kiss to my forehead. "I’m sorry.

I’ve just been exhausted lately." "Once this busy stretch blows over, I’ll take time off to be with you." At ten that evening, he received another call and left in a hurry.

Before walking out the door, he poured me a glass of warm water and placed the evening pill into my palm. "Take this, then get some sleep." The moment the front door clicked shut, I sat there in silence, motionless.

The pill resting in my palm was pale yellow. Yet the progesterone tablets the doctor showed me this morning were undeniably white.

I slid the yellow tablet under my tongue, lifted the glass of water, and mimed swallowing. Only after Julian watched me 'swallow' it did he grab his car keys and leave.

The second his footsteps faded down the hall toward the elevator, I dashed into the bathroom and spat the tablet onto a tissue.

Soaked in saliva, the edges had already begun to dissolve, releasing a faint, metallic bitterness. I walked over and tore open the original, sealed packaging from the clinic.

Every single pill inside was stark white. Then I flipped open Julian’s sorted weekly pill box.

The morning slots contained white pills, but every single evening slot was filled with pale yellow tablets. My hands began to shake uncontrollably.

This wasn't a mixup of a single pill. Someone had deliberately swapped out my evening medication.

And since we returned from the clinic today, the only person who had touched that pill organizer was Julian. Staring at that row of yellow pills, my breath caught in my throat.

Two years ago, during my first pregnancy, he was the one in charge of sorting my daily vitamins and meds.

I suffered from severe morning sickness back then, and every night, he lovingly handed me my pills with a glass of water.

During my second pregnancy, I was so terrified of another loss that I barely stepped outside our apartment.

He personally packed every single prenatal pill into the organizer, watching me swallow them every single day. I used to think that was the purest form of love.

Now, that tender devotion felt like invisible hands wrapping around my neck, squeezing the life out of me. I pulled out my phone and messaged my college friend, Chloe.

She worked as a senior researcher at a private pharmaceutical testing lab. I snapped a clear photo of the yellow pill and asked if she could run an analysis for me.

Chloe called me back within seconds. "I can't identify it just from a photo." "Bring the physical sample to my lab tomorrow.

I’ll run a mass spectrometry test myself." She paused, her tone dropping into dead seriousness. "Serena, you’re pregnant.

Do not put any unverified pills into your body." "And whatever you do, don't mention this to anyone yet."

I whispered an agreement. After hanging up, I carefully emptied all the yellow pills out of the organizer, replacing them with identically sized overthecounter vitamins.

I sealed the real yellow tablets inside an airtight bag and tucked it deep into the hidden lining of an old suitcase. By 1:00 AM, Julian still hadn't come home.

I logged into our luxury apartment's resident portal and pulled up the hallway security footage. From 2:40 AM to 2:52 AM the previous night, the feed was completely blank.

The system log stated: Routine System Maintenance. Yet routine maintenance for the building was strictly scheduled for the end of each month.

I scrolled further back in the archives.

On the exact night the second silver lock appeared a year ago, the camera feed during that same twelveminute window was also completely dark.

The footage from two years ago had already been overwritten by the system. I screenshotted the logs, then dialed the security concierge desk.

After checking their internal tickets, the guard told me, "That maintenance was requested on short notice." "Who submitted the request?" "Mr.

Vance’s executive assistant, Austin." I held the phone tight against my ear, unable to utter a single word.

Why would Julian’s personal assistant request the building to shut down the cameras outside our door on the exact night a silver lock appeared?

The next day, using the excuse of visiting my mother, I slipped past the family chauffeur and headed straight to Chloe’s lab.

Seeing the hollow, drained look on my face, Chloe didn't pry; she took the pill and headed straight into the cleanroom.

During the two hours it took to run the assay, I drove across town to Heritage Silversmiths. It was an antique jewelry studio tucked away on an old street in the west district.

Four years ago, when Julian and I got married, he had customordered our bridal accessories here.

The elderly jeweler examined the three locks through a magnifying loupe for a long time. "Yes, these are from our workshop." "This vintage padlock design is never sold off the shelf.

We only make them for private custom orders." I asked, "Can you pull up the client records?" The owner hesitated. "Our clients sign nondisclosure agreements." I laid out the photos of all three silver locks side by side on her counter. "These three locks appeared during my three separate pregnancies.

The first two times, I miscarried." "I have reason to believe these locks are tied to a criminal scheme that killed my babies.

If you don't disclose the purchaser right now, my next stop is the police department." "A criminal raid on an exclusive studio like yours wouldn't look great for business, would it?" Her face drained of color.

After a tense silence, she turned to her computer and brought up the invoices. Three custom orders. Dated two years ago, one year ago, and just last week.

The paying account wasn't personal; it was billed to a corporate consulting firm. I didn't recognize the business name, but the registered billing address punched me in the gut.

It was the old headquarters building of Vance Enterprises. "Who picked them up?" "The first two were collected by a young man in a suit.

The third was delivered via a private courier service." "Do you have security footage?" "We only keep store recordings for ninety days." She paused, then added, "However, I still have the courier dispatch slip for the third order." I snapped a photo of the slip, my fingertips freezing cold.

The moment I stepped out onto the sidewalk, Chloe’s call buzzed through my phone. She said just one single sentence.

I froze dead in my tracks, standing in the middle of the crowded street, the sounds of traffic and passing strangers abruptly fading into a deafening, hollow ringing.

How... could this be the truth?!