Christine’s hand went automatically to her tummy, and she wondered when she’d be able to feel the baby moving. The thought suffused her with happiness, and she leaned back on the soft pillow, feeling the smile spread across her face. The bedroom was so pretty, with a sky-blue color scheme that made her feel restful, and the comforter was a blue hydrangea pattern that matched the curtains on the far wall, three mullioned panes that overlooked their street, with white sheers for privacy. The ceiling was a soft cumulus white, and Christine felt as if she were in girl heaven, for which she sent up a silent prayer of thanks.
Her gaze fell on the laptop, and its dark screen told her that it had fallen asleep, too. Suddenly she remembered. Donor 3319. Zachary Jeffcoat. Her stomach clenched all over again, and she picked up her phone from the night table and checked the screen. Dr. Davidow hadn’t called her, and she checked her phone to make sure that the ringer was on, which it was. She lay back on the pillow, holding the phone. She was close to her mother and wished she could call her to talk it over or maybe go visit them, since her parents lived in nearby Middletown, where she had grown up. But Christine didn’t want to worry her mother any more; her hands were full taking care of Christine’s father, who had Alzheimer’s.
She reminded herself of Dr. Davidow’s sensible words, that Homestead is one of the best banks in the country, that they had procedures in place to ensure only the highest-quality donors, that his own sister had used them, with two successful pregnancies, using the same donor twice. Christine remembered being weirded out when she first heard that was possible, as well as the other icky facts about infertility procedures, but that was when she was a rookie in the infertility world. She’d gotten over the ick factor, like with any other medical malady, and in no time found herself talking with other women in the waiting room about sperm motility or vaginal secretions, the lingo of a club that no one wanted to join. She had come to understand that they were a random group of people linked by a heartbreaking predicament, trying to attain what the rest of the world took for granted, a baby. A family.
So much about the fertility process had opened Christine’s eyes, and some was the exact opposite of what she’d expected; for example, she had expected the doctor’s office to be full of bulletin boards of photos from babies conceived through the various procedures offered by the clinic. But there had been nothing in the decor of Families First that related to babies at all. The art was watercolor landscapes, and the magazines mainstream, unrelated to parenting or pregnancy. A small sign on the door read: Out of consideration for our other patients, we ask that you not bring any babies or children with you to your appointments at our practice.
As Christine went through month after month without becoming pregnant, she came to appreciate the wisdom of the rule, and its mercy. It would’ve killed her to see a new baby in the waiting room; she’d had a hard enough time when she saw babies in the store, smiling and kicking their chubby legs in shopping carts. Christine had never in her life wanted something so badly as she wanted a baby, experiencing her wish as the most fundamental of desires, the primal yearning of an organism to reproduce, obeying an imperative embedded in the DNA of every living creature. She had never given up faith that she would somehow be pregnant, and now she finally was. And she had been the happiest woman on earth until she saw the CNN video.
“Hey,” Marcus said, coming out of the bathroom, a light blue bath towel wrapped around his waist. His body looked pumped, his shoulders broad with strong caps, his biceps full, and his torso tapered to the towel. His hair was wet, which made it look almost brown, and water droplets dotted his chest.
“Oh, hi.” Christine managed a smile as she shifted up against the headboard, upholstered with the hydrangea fabric. “Have fun at the driving range?”
“Not really.”
“Why not?” Christine asked, surprised. Usually Marcus felt terrific after he’d been to the driving range. It reduced his stress level, relaxing him, and they’d had some of the best times in bed after he’d come home from hitting a bucket.
“You’re not interested in golf.”
“No, but I’m interested in you.” Christine patted the bed beside her, and Marcus sat down, showing her his palm, which was pink and large, but callused at the pads under each finger.
“See how that’s red? I’m squeezing too hard. It’s like a death grip. It’s an easy fix. I have to chill out. It’s just a bad night. Everybody has a bad night.”
“Sure, of course.” Christine could see he didn’t want to dwell on it, so she let it go. Marcus was a sensitive man despite his jocky appearance, and it was best to say less when he was out of sorts. His late mother Barbara “Beebee” Nilsson, a lovely woman and an accomplished equestrian, used to refer to Marcus as a “draft horse,” explaining that he had a big, strong body but was a softy inside. Christine wouldn’t have put it that way, but understood that it was meant with love, and she had known Beebee only a year when she passed suddenly, from an aneurism. Christine was less a fan of her egotistical father-in-law Frederik, who hadn’t waited long to start dating before he eventually remarried.
“You fell asleep early.”
“I know, I’m beat.”
“You hungry? Do you want anything from downstairs?”
“No, did you eat? I feel terrible there’s nothing in there. I was going to go food shopping after school, but then we had the party.”
“Don’t worry about it. I had more cake. I’m having a cake baby.” Marcus patted his waist, which was still trim enough to qualify as a four-pack. She had met him her freshman year of college, when he was a hunky junior in her Government class. She’d done a double-take when she saw him pick up his backpack and his forearm rippled with not only two muscles, but three. It was lust at first sight, though love came later and happily, stuck around for the duration. They had been married for seven years, happy as fried clams.
“So what did Lauren think? About our donor?”
“She didn’t think it was the same person, either. For what it’s worth, we called Dr. Davidow and told him.”
“Really?” Marcus pursed his lips. “What did he say?”
“He said he would call Homestead and get back to us. They’re the only ones who know the donor’s identity. The doctor’s only the broker.”
“I knew that.”
“I didn’t.” Christine blinked, feeling vaguely dumb. It wasn’t a feeling she liked, which was why she had so much empathy with her reading students. Most of them had tracking problems or problems identifying words, the kind of challenges that left them feeling stupid or excluded even though they fell short of dyslexia or other diagnosed reading disorders.
“Did Dr. Davidow tell you about the screening they do for donors?”
“Not really.” Christine saw the pain crossing Marcus’s face, and she felt guilty even having the discussion. “Truly, I’m not worried about it as much as I was before. I think it’s probably just a fear. I felt better after I talked to him.”
“Good.” Marcus lifted an eyebrow. “I was worried Lauren would rile you up.”
“No, she didn’t. She listened, but she didn’t get me crazier than I already am.”
“Good. I like you just the level of crazy you are.”
“Me, too.” Christine touched his arm, stroking the curve of his bicep, still damp.
“God, I’m beat, too,” Marcus said, unsmiling, and Christine knew it was code that he wasn’t in the mood to make love. She hadn’t been either, so she didn’t press the point. Their sex life hadn’t been a problem until their infertility issues. The fun had gone out of their lovemaking back when they still thought Christine was the one with the problem; instead of a loving expression, sex acquired a single-minded purpose, to get pregnant. The situation had gotten worse after their problem was diagnosed as Marcus’s. He had lost all interest in sex, and one or two times, hadn’t been able to perform. They had only recently gotten their sex life back on track, but Christine worried that today’s focus
on Donor 3319 wouldn’t help.
“I really like Dr. Davidow,” she said. “He took me seriously, but he didn’t become alarmed.”
“There’s no reason for alarm.”
“He told me that if there were any problem with our donor, they would take the sperm off the shelves.”
“Really.” Marcus lifted an eyebrow, and Christine leaned over, pulled her laptop into her lap, and pressed ENTER to wake it up.
“Yes, they take the donation off the shelf if the kids are born with a clubfoot or a lazy eye, stuff like that.”
“Interesting.”
“Agree.” Christine felt she had redeemed herself, knowing something he didn’t. She navigated out of the Nutmeg Hill website and back to Homestead’s, plugging in Donor 3319 into the search function. She had checked it every fifteen minutes until she had fallen asleep. “He said that it probably wasn’t a problem if his sperm was still available.”
“That makes sense.”
“He and I checked together, and it was still available.” Christine clicked the link for Donor 3319, but froze when she read the screen. The entry for Donor 3319 had been changed. Now it read: Sperm Temporarily Unavailable! Sorry!
“Oh my God, no,” Christine said, stricken.
Chapter Six
“Who are you calling?” Christine asked, as Marcus pressed a number into his cell phone. Still in his towel, he had gone for his phone as soon as he’d seen that the sperm was unavailable. He didn’t seem upset, only determined, but Christine was panicking. Her mouth was dry, her heart was pounding. She kept refreshing the laptop screen, thinking there must have been some mistake with the website.
“I’m calling Homestead.”
“But they work through Davidow.”
“Homestead sold us the sperm and they’re going to answer to us.” Marcus brought the phone to his ear.
“Don’t you think we should call him first?” Christine couldn’t think clearly. Her emotions tumbled one over the other: fear, disbelief, agony, shock. She didn’t know if she was making too much of it, or too little. She felt sick to her stomach again, not knowing if it was from her pregnancy, the turn of events, or both.
“I’m not going to ask anybody for permission to find out what I need to know.”
“Not for his permission, just to see if he talked to them.” Christine didn’t even know why she was fussing at him. Marcus was great in an emergency, a logical thinker with an innate mechanical sense. He was tailor-made to be an architectural engineer, working every day to make buildings functional and structurally sound, and he had endless patience for calculating stresses and loads, as well as hammering out the details of electrical, heating, plumbing, and energy efficiency systems, which had become a growing specialty of his firm.
“Davidow must have called Homestead. It’s too coincidental that our donor comes off the shelves after you phoned him.”
Christine couldn’t deny that Marcus might be right. Still, she couldn’t collect her thoughts.
Marcus said into the phone, “Hello, my name is Marcus Nilsson, and my wife conceived about two months ago using Donor 3319. I would like to speak with someone in charge about him. Yes, I’ll hold for the assistant director.”
Christine sat straighter in bed, trying to get her act together. “Can you put it on speaker?”
“Yes.” Marcus hit the SPEAKER button, then a woman’s voice came on the line.
“Mr. Nilsson, this is Lee Ann Demipetto. How may I help you?”
“My wife conceived using sperm from Donor 3319 and she is almost two months pregnant. We saw a news report today that a man named Zachary Jeffcoat was arrested for serial murder in Pennsylvania, and my wife is concerned that he is our donor. Now we see that Donor 3319’s sperm has been taken off the shelves. We’d like to know if Donor 3319 is Zachary Jeffcoat.”
“Mr. Nilsson, we usually deal with your healthcare provider—”
“I understand that, but I’d like you to deal with me.” Marcus kept his tone firm and controlled. “Is Donor 3319 Zachary Jeffcoat?”
“Mr. Nilsson, I did have a phone conversation tonight with Dr. Davidow, and he told me of your concerns. We are going to investigate this matter, and we agreed that in an abundance of caution, we would remove 3319 from our general inventory of available donors.”
“You didn’t answer my question. Is Donor 3319 Zachary Jeffcoat or not?”
Christine tried to stay calm while she listened. Her panic was giving way to stone cold fear. If Marcus was worried, then she was really worried.
“Mr. Nilsson, I’m sorry, but we cannot disclose that information. If you review the contract you signed with Homestead—”
“I didn’t sign any contract.”
“I have the file in front of me, and you did sign a contract. I’m looking at a scanned copy of your signature and your wife’s signature. It would’ve been given to you by Dr. Davidow or one of his associates.”
Christine remembered their signing the contract, four pages of fine print, probably in her file. She didn’t remember reading it, but she would’ve signed anything to get a baby.
“Mr. Nilsson, do you recall that contract now? Paragraph 27 of your agreement clearly states, ‘Homestead will not under any circumstances release identifying information on our donors to any other party, including the parents of individuals conceived using Homestead donor sperm.’”
“So you’re not going to answer my question?”
“No, I can’t. The terms of our contract with you are clear. In addition, we have a contractual relationship with 3319, which states explicitly that we promise to keep his identity anonymous, under any and all circumstances.”
“So you really won’t tell me?” Marcus raised his voice.
“I’m legally bound to 3319 not to.”
“Legally bound to a serial killer, over a paying customer? Over us?”
“In any event, Mr. Nilsson.”
Christine’s heart hammered. Demipetto sounded so final, her voice rich with authority, as if she had been ready for the call.
“Mr. Nilsson, our legal requirement that we keep confidential the identity of our sperm and egg donors is the cornerstone of Homestead and every other bank in the country. In addition, 3319 stated explicitly in his interview that he did not want his identity revealed because of his parents’ religious beliefs, which conflicted with his own.”
Marcus scoffed. “What kind of religious beliefs does a serial killer have?”
“I understand your concern, and we hope that you will understand our concern. Homestead helps over twelve thousand women a year to conceive, and the integrity of our process is of paramount importance to us. The keystone of our system is the anonymity of our donors—”
“Can you at least tell me his birth date?”
“No.”
“Place of birth?”
“No.”
“When did he make the donation?”
“I can’t disclose that.”
“Can you verify that he’s in medical school? He had been accepted when he filled out the form.”
“The information we are given by our donors is verified, to the extent possible, at the time of donation. We do not keep ongoing tabs on our donors, and you can understand how updating this information would be beyond our means.”
Christine felt herself slump backwards against the headboard, suddenly weak. She tried to wrap her mind around what she was hearing, the shock settling into her very bones.
“No, I don’t understand that,” Marcus shot back, irate. “I think that’s your responsibility. I own a business, and I stand behind my relationships to my clients.”
“Homestead is not a business, per se—”
“Of course it is. You charged me for the sperm. What screening do you do for your sperm donors, specifically?”
“We screen for chlamydia, HIV one and two, hepatitis B, gonorrhea, hepatitis C, syphilis. We do genetic screening for cystic fibrosis, spinal muscular atrophy, and various hemogl
obins for thalassemia. We do a standard CBC and chem panel. Our sperm samples meet current FDA and Tissue Bank licensing protocol at the time of release, which you will see at paragraph 17 of your contract and—”
“I’m not talking about blood panels. This is a situation where someone is arrested for serial killing. Do you do criminal-background checks?”
“Yes.”
“You checked our donor’s criminal record?”
“Yes, or he would not have been approved for donation.”
“So Donor 3319 had no criminal record?”
“As I said, no one is approved with a criminal record.”
Marcus shook his head. “That doesn’t answer my question, but okay.”
Suddenly a text alert sounded on Christine’s phone, and she glanced at the screen. The banner showed it was Lauren, and the text read, Call Me. The website is changed. Christine picked up the phone and texted back, On it.
Marcus was asking Demipetto, “Do you do psychological checks?”
“We screen for immediate family with a mental illness, such as schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. You can see that in the online donor profiles.”
“But that relies on the donor’s say-so.”
“Yes, and we note that in every donor profile, including 3319’s. It reads, ‘The above family and medical history, and all other information, has been self-reported by the donor. We work with each donor to obtain as complete and accurate information as possible, but we are unable to completely rule out the existence of health or other information that is not known or that remains unreported to us.’”