Hired a Gigolo Got a Billionaire (Zoey and Christian) novel Chapter 496

Chapter 496

Marcus’ POV

The nurse didn’t answer.

Her eyes just widened, panic so clearly written across her face that my stomach dropped. She took a step back, then another, her hands visibly shaking.

“I… I need…” she stammered, unable to finish the sentence. And then she turned and ran out of the room.

For one second, neither of us moved.

We just stood there, staring at the empty doorway, as if she might come back at any moment with a logical explanation-Aurora in her arms-laughing it off, saying it had all been a misunderstanding.

But she didn’t come back.

And then Madeline moved.

She threw the covers aside and got out of bed in one abrupt motion. She didn’t say a word. Didn’t look at me. She just started walking toward the door, fast despite the pain she had to be in.

“Madeline-” I started, but she was already in the hallway.

I ran after her, catching up in just a few steps. I grabbed her hand-not to stop her, but to go with her. To be there. Whatever was happening.

The corridor felt wrong.

Even in the middle of the night, there was too much movement. Nurses whispering urgently to one another. Doors opening and closing. A security guard speaking quietly into a radio. Everyone looked tense. Rushed. Afraid.

Madeline walked fast, almost running, her eyes fixed straight ahead. I felt her fingers crushing mine with desperate strength, but when I looked at her face, what I saw scared me more than any scream could

have.

She was blank.

Completely blank.

Her eyes were open, but empty-as if she’d disconnected from everything, as if the only thing her brain could still process was: walk, get there, find Aurora.

We reached the nursery.

The door was open, and through it I saw more movement. More people. An older woman in a white coat was on the phone, her voice tight with tension. Two nurses were checking something on a clipboard, their hands visibly shaking.

1/4

And the cribs.

I could see them through the glass window. Some with babies sleeping peacefully. Some empty.

One of them had a small card.

I could read it even from a distance.

Aurora Kensington.

Her crib was empty.

My legs nearly gave out. I grabbed the doorframe to keep from collapsing.

“Where is my daughter?” Madeline said, and her voice came out so broken, so utterly destroyed, that everyone inside the nursery stopped what they were doing and turned to look at us.

The woman in the white coat hung up the phone quickly and walked toward us. She had gray hair and tired eyes, and she was trying-and failing-to hide her panic.

“Mr. and Mrs. Kensington,” she said, her voice trembling slightly. “I’m Dr. Helena, the maternity supervisor. Please, we need you to-”

“Where is my daughter?” Madeline screamed. The sound echoed down the hallway. Several people turned their heads. “Where is Aurora?”

“We don’t know,” Dr. Helena said—and at least she had the decency to be honest. “She… she is not in the nursery. We’re searching all departments, checking if she was taken for any tests without proper documentation, but-”

“But you don’t think that’s what happened,” I finished, my voice cold. “Do you?”

She hesitated for just a fraction of a second.

It was enough.

“We’ve called security,” she finally admitted. “And the police are being notified. Mr. Kensington, there are indications that someone may have… taken Aurora.”

The world stopped.

Taken.

Kidnapped.

Our daughter was only a few hours old.

And she had been kidnapped.

I heard a strange sound beside me. It was Madeline. A low, continuous moan was coming from her, like her body no longer knew how to express the pain ripping through her. Her legs gave out.

2/4

I caught her before she hit the floor, but she didn’t seem to notice. She just kept making that sound-that broken, unbearable sound-her eyes locked on the empty crib with our daughter’s name on it.

“No, no, no,” she started to murmur, her voice completely unraveling. “My baby, my baby… she needs me, she must be hungry, she must be scared, she doesn’t know anyone, she’s only hours old, she-”

Her voice shattered into sobs. I pulled her tightly against me, feeling her body shake violently in my arms.

“We’re going to find her,” I whispered into her hair, my own tears finally spilling over. “We’re going to bring Aurora back. I swear, Madeline. I swear.”

But even as I said the words, a cold voice inside me asked: How? How were we going to find her?

And then, as if that thought had summoned the answer, another voice cut through the chaos.

“It was him,” Madeline said suddenly, lifting her face from my chest. Her eyes were red, ruined-but there was something new there now. Something fierce. Burning. “Dominic. It was Dominic. I know it was.”

Dr. Helena approached again, this time followed by two hospital security guards.

“Mr. and Mrs. Kensington, if you can give us any information that might help identify possible suspects-”

“Dominic Blackwood,” I said immediately, every syllable of his name burning like acid in my throat. “He… he’s obsessed with my wife.”

“We’ll pass that information to the police right away,” she said, motioning to one of the guards, who grabbed a radio and began speaking rapidly.

Another guard stepped closer, holding a tablet.

“We managed to recover some footage from the cameras that were still working,” he said, turning the screen toward us. “This woman appears in several corridors. Do you recognize her?”

I stared at the grainy image. A woman in a nurse’s uniform, mask and cap hiding most of her face. But there was something familiar in the way she moved, in how she carried that gym bag.

Then she turned her head slightly, and the camera caught her profile for just a fraction of a second.

“Vivian,” I whispered. “It’s Vivian.”

Madeline made a strangled sound beside me.

“That bitch,” she said, so much venom in her voice that the guard instinctively stepped back. “She works for him. If she took Aurora… if she touched my daughter…”

She couldn’t finish. She collapsed into sobs again.

I held her against me, my own thoughts spiraling into chaos. Dominic had Aurora. Dominic Blackwood- the obsessed psychopath who had poisoned people, who had hunted Madeline for months, who had never accepted losing-had our newborn daughter.

3/4

Chapter 49S

What was he going to do with her? What did he want?

The questions spun through my head, each one more terrifying than the last. Rage boiled inside me, tangled with fear and guilt and desperation. I should have protected her better. I should have seen this coming. I should have-

I felt Madeline go rigid in my arms.

I looked down and saw that she’d pulled slightly away, her hand sliding into the pocket of her hospital robe. She took out her phone, and even from where I stood, I could see the screen light up.

A notification.

A message.

I watched her face change. Her eyes widened. Her mouth opened in a silent oh. Then all the color drained from her face, leaving her so pale I thought she might faint.

Her hands shook so badly the phone nearly slipped from her fingers.

“Madeline?” I called, my heart slamming in my chest. “Love… what is it?”

Comments

Support

Share

4/4