My Daughter Cut the Cake and Burst into Tears, While the Baker Waved to Me Strangely at the Yard Gate

My daughter picked up the first piece of cake in her hand and immediately burst into tears, as if someone had revealed before her not the sex of a child, but her entire life.

Even the midday sun could not cover the small lights hanging in the yard. Glasses of lemonade stood on the table, while pink and blue napkins were mixed together on the white tablecloth. It had taken Chloe four years to reach this day. She had lost two pregnancies, and after three unsuccessful treatments the doctor finally told her that the baby was healthy.

Spencer stood beside her and carefully placed his hands over her belly.

“Are you ready?” he asked with a smile.

Chloe nodded.

“This time nothing will frighten me.”

But I saw how her fingers clutched the knife handle. White cream stuck to the edge of the knife. Chloe slowly cut the cake, the guests leaned forward, and I held my breath.

A pink filling appeared in the piece.

“It’s a girl!” someone shouted.

The yard filled with applause and laughter. Spencer hugged Chloe.

“She will be our daughter.”

Chloe looked at the cake for several seconds. Then tears ran down her cheeks.

“I know,” she said.

There was no joy in her voice. Nor relief. Only fear.

“Chloe, what happened?” I went to her.

“Nothing, Mom. I’m just… a little tired.”

Spencer immediately looked at me.

“Emotions during pregnancy are a normal thing.”

The paper plate was folding in his hand. The white cardboard crumpled between his fingers as if he were trying to hide something.

Just then I noticed the baker, who was standing at the yard gate. He had personally brought the cake in the morning. Now he was looking at Chloe, and such tension was written on his face that a bad feeling passed through my heart.

When our eyes met, he waved to me.

“Nora, may I have a minute?”

“Now?”

“Please. Not here.”

He led me to a white van parked behind the yard. The smell of paint and the steam of warm cardboard mixed together. The baker took out his phone and lowered the volume.

“Your son-in-law came to the bakery this morning.”

“Spencer?”

“Yes. He was not alone.”

He turned on a recording on the screen. Spencer stood at the counter. Beside him stood an unfamiliar woman in a black hat and with a brown paper bag. The woman placed a sealed envelope on the counter.

“They offered us five hundred lari to change the doctor’s answer,” the baker told me quietly.

I felt cold in my stomach.

“What kind of answer?”

“I don’t know that yet. But Spencer said that there had been a mistake in the envelope.”}]},{

I looked toward the yard. Spencer was still hugging Chloe, as if nothing had happened. Chloe, however, was turning her face away.

“Who is that woman?”

The baker rewound the recording.

“She came back after Spencer left. Alone. And she asked me to attach something under the cake.”},{

“What something?”

He held his breath.

“She told me that if she could not reach you, you had to find this.”

We returned to the table. The guests were already gradually dispersing. Chloe was talking to a friend, but Spencer did not take his eyes off her.

“We have to check right now,” I told the baker.

“Nora, what are you doing?” Spencer suddenly approached us.

“There is something under the cake.”

His face changed in an instant.

“That’s nonsense.”

“Then you won’t be afraid if I check.”

Chloe turned toward us.

“Mom, what’s happening?”

I slid both hands under the heavy cake board. The edge of the wooden table scratched my wrist, but I did not feel the pain. I slowly lifted the board, and a folded envelope attached to the underside of the paper appeared.

Spencer reached his hand toward me.

“Nora, don’t open it…”

But the baker’s fingers were already moving toward the envelope…

The baker carefully removed the envelope. The adhesive tape was still warm, as if someone had attached it only a little while earlier.

“Don’t touch it!” Spencer shouted.

Chloe turned pale.

“Why are you shouting?”

Spencer stopped. A vein on his wrist was throbbing strongly.

“I don’t know what your mother is doing. It may be dangerous for the baby.”

“The envelope was under the cake,” I said. “It is not dangerous, but suspicious.”

Chloe ran over to me.

“Show me.”

Only her name was written on the envelope. The letters were written in the unfamiliar woman’s hand. Inside, the corner of a sheet sealed with the doctor’s stamp could be seen, and also a small memory card.

Spencer suddenly knocked over a chair.

“This is my family!”

“That is exactly why you must know the truth,” I said.

Chloe looked toward him.

“Spencer, do you know that woman?”

He could not answer.

The baker took out his phone.

“I have a recording. If you take one more step, I will call the police.”

Spencer stopped, but his eyes were already fixed on the paper.

Chloe took the envelope from me. Her fingers were trembling.

“Mom, open it.”

I tore open the sealed edge. I took out the sheet, but did not have time to read it. I noticed a small inscription on the memory card: “Listen to the end.”

At that same moment Spencer’s phone rang. The name of that unfamiliar woman appeared on the screen.

He looked at the call, then at Chloe, and said quietly:

“If you listen to this, the baby is already in danger…”

Spencer answered the call, but turned on the speaker. Every sound in the yard fell silent. The woman’s trembling voice came from the phone.

“Spencer, they already know. I can’t hide this anymore.”

“Shut up, Mara,” he told her through clenched teeth.

Chloe clutched her belly.

“Who is Mara?”

For several seconds, only breathing could be heard on the other end of the call.

“The woman who brought the envelope,” I said.

Spencer turned off the phone, but it was already too late. The baker inserted the memory card into a small device. The recording began.

At first we heard the sound of a doctor’s office.

“The fetus is male. The pregnancy is developing normally.”

Chloe closed her eyes. Spencer, meanwhile, froze as if there were no air left in the room.

Then his voice was heard on the recording.

“If it is a boy, Chloe will sign more easily. In the case of a girl, she will become suspicious.”

Chloe slowly looked at me.

“What will I sign?”

Mara’s voice was heard in the recording.

“You tell her that temporary guardianship is needed for the baby. In reality, the family is to receive it. They will pay two hundred thousand.”

Someone dropped a glass in the yard. The sound of breaking glass rang out horribly clearly.

Spencer shook his head.

“This is edited.”

“It is your voice,” Chloe said.

“Mara is crazy. She is in debt and wants to destroy me.”

I took a second sheet from the envelope. It was the clinic’s original answer and a copy of the child-transfer agreement. It did not yet have a signature, but Chloe’s name was already written on it.

Chloe read the sheet. Then she went toward Spencer.

“Did you sell my child?”

“No! I was looking for a solution.”

“A solution to my four years of pain?”

Spencer fell to his knees.

“I had debts. I thought I would give everything back to you later.”

“The child too?”

He had no answer anymore.

The baker stopped the recording and dialed the police number. Chloe sat down on a chair, and I put my arm around her shoulders.

But just then my phone rang. The number of the clinic’s chief doctor appeared on the screen.

“Nora,” the doctor said as soon as I answered, “do not call the police yet. Your daughter must know one more thing. Spencer obtained official permission from the clinic this morning to take the baby away…”

I looked at Spencer. He was still on his knees, but there was no longer fear written on his face. Something more frightening was visible there—the certainty that he still had time.

The doctor added quietly:

“And this permission comes into force tomorrow morning at six o’clock…”