Robert Hale placed the consent form on the reception desk, and Patricia Caldwell stared at her own name beneath Lauren’s forged signature.
For several seconds, no one moved.
Rain tapped against the clinic windows.
Somewhere behind the nurses’ station, a printer continued feeding out pages as if the room had not just split open.
Patricia’s face lost its practiced composure first.
“That is not what it looks like,” she said.
Lauren remained seated.
Her hands were folded over the navy folder in her lap, though every muscle in her body wanted to grab the document and tear it apart.
The signature looked enough like hers to fool someone who had only seen it on holiday cards or insurance forms.
The first letter leaned the way hers did.
The final stroke curved upward.
But Lauren knew every mark she had ever made during five years of fertility treatment.
She had never signed that page.
Robert pointed to the witness line.
“This form states that Patricia Caldwell personally observed Lauren Whitaker authorize the release and transfer of embryo HFC-19-447B.”
Patricia glanced toward Dr.
Mercer.
It was quick, but not quick enough.
Robert saw it.
So did Evelyn Shaw, Lauren’s attorney.
Evelyn stepped beside the desk and opened her briefcase.
“My client was in Savannah on the date listed here.
Her hotel receipt, toll records, and conference registration confirm it.
She could not have signed this document in Charleston.”
“Then someone made a clerical error,” Patricia said.
“A clerical error does not imitate a signature,” Evelyn replied.
Dr.
Mercer wiped his forehead.
“We should continue this conversation in my office.
There are patients present.”
Robert did not lower his voice.
“Your clinic transferred a human embryo using documents that appear fraudulent.
The patients present deserve to know whether Harborview protects consent records.”
A nurse behind the desk looked at Dr.
Mercer with open alarm.
Patricia reached for her phone.
“Please leave it where it is,” Robert said.
“You cannot seize my property.”
“I haven’t.
I am asking you not to warn anyone while we determine whether evidence is being destroyed.”
Her hand froze above her purse.
Lauren watched the woman who had humiliated her at dinners, corrected her clothes, and once suggested that repeated pregnancy loss might be a sign that she was not meant for motherhood.
Patricia had always filled every room with certainty.
Now she appeared to be searching for the nearest exit.
Robert removed a second document from the case folder.
It was a copy of Harborview’s private garage log.
Patricia’s car had entered at 8:14 p.m.
on the night the consent form was delivered.
Travis Caldwell’s car entered six minutes later.
Both were signed in by Marianne Cole, the clinic’s former administrative director.
“I attended a charity committee meeting here,” Patricia said.
Dr.
Mercer shut his eyes.
Robert turned to him.
“Was Harborview hosting a charity committee meeting at 8:14 on a Thursday night?”
