The officer nodded.
“We will keep them outside.
Police investigators are also on their way.”
Emma flinched at the word police.
Lucas took her hand.
“You decide how much you say and when.
No one else decides for you now.”
Minutes later, Richard called again.
This time Lucas answered and placed the phone on speaker after asking Emma’s permission.
“You are escalating a private family matter,” Richard said.
“My wife was denied medical care.”
“That is her interpretation.”
“The doctor found injuries.”
“Pregnancy creates complications.
Emma has always been prone to dramatizing conflict.”
From the bed, Emma’s expression changed.
Fear was still there, but something harder rose beneath it.
Lucas asked, “When did I sign the guardianship authorization?”
Richard paused.
“The documents were prepared during the Milwaukee transaction.”
“That was not my question.”
“You signed several time-sensitive papers that week.”
“Where?”
“In your hotel suite.”
Lucas looked at Emma.
He had not stayed in a hotel suite.
The seller had provided a private apartment above the property, and Richard knew it because he had arranged the closing schedule.
Lucas continued calmly.
“Who witnessed my signature?”
Richard’s voice sharpened.
“I will not conduct an evidentiary hearing over the telephone.”
“You just claimed to remember where I signed.
Now you cannot remember who watched.”
Margaret’s voice appeared faintly in the background.
“End the call.”
Richard ignored her.
“Your wife is manipulating you while you are emotional.”
Emma reached toward the phone.
Lucas handed it to her.
For weeks, she had been told that speaking would cost her child.
Her fingers trembled, but her voice did not.
“You wrote that I refused medical treatment,” she said.
“Your nurse canceled the appointments.”
“She is not my nurse.”
“She called you every night.”
Silence followed.
Emma looked at Lucas and pointed toward the drawer containing her personal belongings.
“My phone,” she whispered.
A nurse retrieved it in a sealed hospital bag.
The battery was nearly dead, but the device turned on.
Emma opened the voice recorder.
“I started recording after she showed me the papers,” she said.
There were four files.
In the first, the private nurse told Emma that Lucas had authorized complete bed rest and did not want to be disturbed.
In the second, Margaret’s voice could be heard saying, “Once the child is safe, the court will see that Emma is not equipped for this family.”
The third captured Richard instructing the nurse to document every time Emma cried, argued, or requested a hospital.
