Chapter 1 - THE THIRD IMPOSSIBLE PREGNANCY
The third pregnancy began with a whisper.
“Mother,” Sister Esperanza said from the doorway, “I think I’m pregnant again.”
Mother Caridad Morales looked up from the utility bill in front of her.
For one impossible second, the only sound in the office was the old electric kettle clicking itself off.
Morning light passed through the narrow stained-glass window of Santa Lucía Convent and scattered blue and red across the adobe floor.
Esperanza stood beneath it with five-month-old Tomás asleep against her shoulder.
Two-year-old Miguel clung to the side of her white habit and rolled a wooden truck over his bare foot.
“Pregnant?”
Esperanza nodded.
Caridad pushed back from the desk.
The chair scraped hard enough to make Miguel look up.
“No.”
Esperanza’s expression changed.
“Mother?”
“How do you know?”
“The same way I knew with Miguel.”
“That was different.”
“And Tomás.”
Caridad stood.
“Esperanza.”
“Nausea. Dizziness. The heaviness.”
“You gave birth five months ago.”
“I know.”
“You’re nursing.”
“I know.”
“You live in a convent.”
A flash of pain crossed Esperanza’s face.
“I know that too.”
Santa Lucía stood on a high patch of land outside Chimayó, New Mexico, beyond an acequia and a road that turned to mud every August during monsoon season.
Eight women lived inside its old adobe walls.
The gates were locked every night.
The sisters attended morning prayer, worked in the weaving studio, tended an orchard of apricot and apple trees, and sold embroidered altar linens to churches across the Southwest.
Men entered only for scheduled deliveries, diocesan inspections, or repairs.
Every visit was recorded.
The first time Esperanza became pregnant, Caridad had assumed there had to be a man.
The second time, she assumed there had to be a lie.
Now there was a third child.
And Caridad no longer knew which possibility frightened her more.
Esperanza placed one hand over Tomás’s back.
“I haven’t broken my vows.”
“Then explain this.”
“I can’t.”
Caridad walked toward her.
“Three pregnancies do not happen because no one can explain them.”
“I know what biology requires.”
“Then stop speaking to me as if I’m attacking your faith.”
Esperanza’s eyes filled.
“Maybe faith is all I have left.”
“No.”
Caridad lowered her voice.
“You have Miguel. You have Tomás. You have me. But I will not call something holy merely because I’m afraid to call it something else.”
Esperanza looked away.
Miguel pressed his forehead into her robe.
Caridad’s anger disappeared as quickly as it had come.
“When did you first feel sick?”
“Three mornings ago.”
“Any bleeding?”
“No.”
“Pain?”
“A little cramping.”
“Have you taken a test?”
Esperanza shook her head.
Caridad reached for the phone.
“I’m calling Dr. Reyes.”
Esperanza did not object.
That bothered Caridad.
She had expected fear.
Instead, Esperanza looked relieved.
“Thank you.”
She turned toward the door.
Tomás woke and whimpered.
“I need to warm his bottle.”
When Esperanza left, something white near the chair leg caught Caridad’s eye.
A narrow strip of medical tape.
She bent and picked it up.
Fresh.
Clean.
One edge carried a tiny red smear.
Blood.
Caridad brought it to her nose.
Antiseptic.
The smell took her instantly to Santa Lucía’s infirmary.
Dr. Paloma Reyes carried the same kind of tape in her black medical case.
But Paloma had not visited the convent in almost two months.
At least not according to the visitor log.
Paloma arrived that afternoon from Española.
She was sixty-eight, silver-haired, blunt, and still drove the same green Subaru she had owned for fifteen years.
She had delivered Miguel.
Then Tomás.
Before that, she had treated the sisters for everything from shingles to broken wrists.
She examined Esperanza while Caridad waited in the corridor.
Miguel drove his wooden truck over the cracks in the floor.
Tomás slept in a wicker bassinet.
After twenty minutes, Paloma opened the infirmary door.
“She’s pregnant.”
Caridad stared.
“How far?”
“Six weeks. Maybe seven.”
“That isn’t possible.”
Paloma removed her glasses.
“Biology has never cared what human beings consider convenient.”
Caridad pulled the medical tape from her pocket.
“I found this in my office after Esperanza left.”
Paloma’s expression changed.
Only for a fraction of a second.
Caridad saw it.
“You recognize it.”
“It’s medical tape.”
“You’re frightened.”
“I’m tired.”
“You haven’t been here in two months.”
“That’s correct.”
“So why did Esperanza have something from your medical bag?”
“I do not manufacture tape, Caridad.”
“You know what I mean.”
Paloma folded it once.
Then slipped it into her own pocket.
Caridad stared at her hand.
“Give that back.”
Paloma did not.
Instead she said quietly, “Esperanza needs rest.”
“So do I.”
“Then stop turning every object into evidence.”
Caridad’s face hardened.
“Two babies were born inside my convent under circumstances nobody has explained.”
“Your convent?”
Paloma raised an eyebrow.
“That sounds dangerously close to ownership.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yes.”
The doctor picked up her bag.
“And I know what fear makes people do.”
She left before Caridad could answer.
That evening, after Compline, Caridad went to the infirmary.
She told herself she was checking inventory.
Bandages.
Acetaminophen.
Children’s fever reducer.
Prescription cream.
Then she opened the small refrigerator used for medications.
Behind two insulin packs belonging to Sister Agnes was a brown paper pharmacy bag.
Patient:
ELENA VEGA-DELGADO.
Caridad froze.
Esperanza’s legal name before taking vows had been Elena Vega.
Delgado was the surname of the husband she had buried eight years earlier.
Inside the bag were three unopened vials.
Progesterone in oil.
The dispensing label came from a fertility pharmacy in Albuquerque.
Caridad read the instructions.
INJECT 1 ML INTRAMUSCULARLY DAILY AS DIRECTED FOLLOWING EMBRYO TRANSFER.
She heard someone breathing behind her.
Caridad turned.
Esperanza stood in the infirmary doorway.
She looked at the bag.
Then at Caridad.
May you like
And whispered:
“I can explain the first two.”
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