Chapter 10 — Nanny Counts Moles

The police split up and positioned themselves in an area two streets away. I followed the request in the message and went in alone. Tan Man's voice came through the headset. "Don't be afraid, just go forward." "You have a tracking and recording device on your body." I tightly held the fake blood sample tube in my pocket. When entering building number three, a musty smell hit me. The tiles of the first floor lobby are cracked, and there is still a faded obstetrics sign on the wall. The emergency exit lights flashed on and off continuously. The phone vibrated again. Strange number sends new message. Go to the third floor. Alone. I raised my head and looked at the stairs. There are very new gray shoe prints on the stair handrail. I went up step by step. At the end of the second floor hallway, a very soft cry sounded. The sound is similar to Tieu Man, but not the same. I stopped for a second. Tan Man immediately said in the headset: "Don't go astray, the other person might be tempting you." I gritted my teeth and continued to the third floor. The third floor hallway is darker than below. The door to the third hospital room on the right was slightly open. Inside was a table lamp. I pushed the door and walked in. Tieu Man sat on the iron bed, his hands loosely tied with cloth. Seeing me, tears immediately welled up in her eyes. “Mom.” I almost rushed forward. But the next second, a knife pressed against the bed behind her. A man wearing a gray hat stepped out from the darkness. "Put the blood sample on the table." I stared at him. "Let the child go first." The man laughed. "Manh Thanh, you have no right to make conditions now." He raised his hand to pull Tieu Man's hair up. Tieu Man was so scared that he shrank his neck. My heart felt like it was being squeezed. "Don't touch her." The man looked at me. "Then give me the blood sample." I slowly placed the sealed bag on the table. He reached out to take it. The moment he bowed his head, a little girl's voice suddenly rang out in the next hospital room. "Don't give it to him." The voice was very weak. But he called out one sentence clearly. "She will die." 11 The hand of the man in the gray hat suddenly stopped. I also froze in place. There are people in the next hospital room. More than a child. The man reacted very quickly, grabbed the sealed bag on the table and walked straight into the next room. When he turned his back, I rushed to Tieu Man's side and quickly untied the cloth tied to her wrists. Tieu Man's whole body trembled. I hugged her, leaned close to my ear and said: "Don't speak, follow mom." But as soon as she stood up, her legs were weak. Only then did I discover that her shoe laces were tied into a dead knot, making her legs almost impossible to walk. Tieu Man cried and said: "They told me not to run." I squatted down to untie my shoelaces, my fingertips shaking from the force. Suddenly there were footsteps outside the door. The man in the gray hat turned around. In his arms he pulled a small skinny girl. She was probably three or four years old, wearing faded hospital clothes and her hair cut very short. Her face was even whiter than Tieu Man's, and there were many tape marks on the back of her hand. The man pushed the girl to the ground. “Many things.” The girl bumped into the wall but did not cry. It just raised its head to look at me, its eyes surprisingly dark. My heart sank. Because her eyebrows and eyes are very similar to my childhood photo. Tieu Man also looked at her, with fear and confusion in her eyes. "Mom, who is she?" I couldn't answer. The man in the gray hat held up the sealed bag. "Manh Thanh, you are very smart, you know how to carry fake things." My heart sank. He could see again. The man laughed coldly. "Do you think we don't know that the hospital will make a record?" "What we want is for you to come here, not this tube of blood." He took a blood needle from his pocket and threw it at my feet. "Take it yourself." I covered Tieu Man behind me. "What do you need my blood for?" The man glanced at the short-haired girl. "Someone wants to know."

Who should these two children belong to?" "Who?" He didn't answer. In the hallway, there was the sound of leather shoes. Tran Bach Xuyen walked in from outside the door. Behind him was Tham Nghien. Tham Nghien's forehead was torn, as if someone had just beaten him, his hands were tied in front of him with plastic drawstrings. When I saw him, my heart was not painful at all. But it was even colder. Sure enough, they had bypassed the police. Tran Bach Xuyen had changed into a white blouse, wearing a white shirt. He looked at the two children in the room, his face unsightly. "Dai Chi Minh, I told you not to touch Manh Thanh." The man in the gray hat snorted. "Dean Tran, you have said too many words." "You also said Phung Ngoc Cam will not be arrested." "You also said Tham Nghien can keep his wife still." "What is the result?" Tran Bach Xuyen's eyes darkened. "The police are nearby." Dai Chi Minh kicked the blood needle to my leg. "So we have to be faster." While they were talking, I touched the small alarm device hidden in my sleeve and gently pressed it down. Tan Man's voice no longer came through the headset. Tran Bach Xuyen looked at me. "Miss Manh, don't do useless things." "Now just complete the assessment, the child won't be hurt." I stared at him.